


Haunt the corner of my eye

by harryromper



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Auror Harry Potter, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Healer Luna Lovegood, M/M, Mystery And Angst With A Happy Ending, Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, Post-Hogwarts, Post-Second War with Voldemort, Student Draco Malfoy, Wizarding Politics (Harry Potter)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:28:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24673885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harryromper/pseuds/harryromper
Summary: Harry’s life is very much on track. After a successful career as an Auror, he’s set to become the youngest ever Minister for Magic. But strange things are starting to happen at Grimmauld Place. Items he doesn’t recognise are appearing left and right, and somehow he never feels quite alone. There’s only one thing Harry knows for sure: it has something to do with Draco Malfoy.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 110
Kudos: 755
Collections: HD Wireless 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spookywoods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookywoods/gifts).



> Writing over the last few months has felt almost impossible, and this story would never have crossed the finish-line without G, A, C and E, and britpicking from the amazing C. 
> 
> Thank you, spookywoods, for the fantastic prompt.
> 
> It should go without saying, but trans women are women.

Harry emerges sluggishly from a dream in which he’d been making a speech to a crowd of people. A sea of indistinguishable faces and muted applause gives way to a cocoon of tangled bedding. He slides one hand across the mattress but finds the other side of the bed cold and empty.

It takes a minute for his brain to catch up as he rubs at his eyes. Of course it’s empty. He can’t remember the last time he hooked up—longer still since he felt like bringing anyone back to Grimmauld Place. And yet he lies there confused for a minute as if something isn’t right, palm flat against the linen, trying and failing to stitch the pieces of his dream back together.

Harry stretches and thinks about going back to sleep, but whatever speech he was giving doesn’t seem like something he wants to return to. It’s Sunday, and he’s due at the Burrow for lunch in a few hours, but otherwise his day is blissfully clear—something that’s less and less common as the election approaches. Downstairs he can hear Kreacher clattering around in the kitchen. The wizened little elf is increasingly cantankerous in his old age and only at Grimmauld Place on the weekends. Harry’s glad he has plans to go out and doesn’t have to listen to yet another meandering rant about the state of his shirt sleeves.

He takes his time in the shower, whistling a tune he doesn’t recognise, and lingers over toast and coffee at the kitchen table. His own face stares back at him from the front page of the _Prophet._ The headline makes him frown: _Potter Pitches Creature Caution_. He’s pretty sure that’s not what he said, but if there’s one thing he’s learned while campaigning for office it’s that the newspapers are no more accurate about him now than they were when he was in school.

His owl brings a stack of post carefully pre-sorted by his campaign assistant with the latest poll numbers clipped neatly to the top. It’s looking good, he thinks, feeling the last of his waking tension leave his shoulders. Three weeks to go and he’s on track to be the youngest Minister for Magic in wizarding history. He’ll finally be in a position to make real change.

The Burrow’s crowded and noisy as Harry steps through the Floo, and he has to move quickly not to get tripped by Victoire, spiralling past the fire like a whirling dervish. Molly presses a pile of plates into Harry’s hands and a kiss to his cheek, steering him in the direction of the table. 

“Where’s…?” Ron trails off around a mouthful of pilfered Yorkshire pudding. 

“Who?” Harry answers absently as he lays the table. But when he looks up again, Ron is shaking his head and shrugging as if he’s forgotten the rest of his question. 

“You’re getting dotty in your old age.” Hermione squeezes Ron’s arm fondly and trails Harry around the table laying cutlery beside the plates. The aroma from the kitchen is warm and delicious and Harry fears his stomach may start rumbling at an embarrassing volume.

“ _Prophet_ coverage was a bit alarmist this morning, wasn’t it?” Ron tries again, swallowing quickly as his mother comes into the room, fixing him with a warning stare as she wields a gravy boat in each hand. 

Harry shrugs. “There’s some bleeding hearts that think we need to focus more on some academic idea of rights than on prioritising wizarding safety. It’s not reflected in the numbers.”

Hermione pauses as if she’s about to say something but then furrows her brow, her mouth a thin line. 

“You disagree?” Harry asks.

She shakes her head slowly. “No, I … you’re absolutely right. We need to take a much firmer stance. What Kingsley’s proposing is outrageous.” 

Platters of roast chicken float in from the kitchen, arranging themselves neatly down the centre of the table. Harry thinks it’s time they concentrated on that and not whatever nonsense the _Prophet_ has chosen to write about him and says as much. 

“Hear hear,” George agrees, leaning right across the table to snag a particularly delicious-looking chicken leg from right under Harry’s nose. 

The conversation is easy, as it is every week, and Harry feels relaxed and at home. Rose natters away on his left about a school project she’s been working on studying bees. Even Percy’s obsequiousness seems tolerable as he bends Harry’s ear about some dull Ministry initiative he thinks deserves Harry’s full attention once he’s elected.

It’s hard to imagine, sometimes—if it all comes together the way he hopes—what it will be like to leave the Aurors and have to deal with the likes of Percy and whatever bee he has in his bonnet day in and day out. But it will be worth it, Harry thinks confidently. It’s been over a decade since the War and it’s time the wizarding world faces up to reality and does what it needs to do to make sure something like that never happens again.

And if that means getting the _Prophet’s_ nose out of joint, or having to put up with a few more Percies in his life, well, so be it.

Harry’s determined that death won’t touch his family again. 

_It’s time to get things back on track_. 

“So, Harry, counting down the days now, I suppose?” Arthur asks. “I must say, it will be good to have some clear direction from the top.”

Harry nods. It’s not that Kingsley’s been ineffectual as Minister, but he really has started to be very lax. All this talk of tolerance and forgiveness. As soon as he started to advocate for bringing the post-War period of exile, reparations, and magic restrictions for Death Eaters to a close, Harry knew he had to do something. That simply can’t happen.

“He means well,” Harry says diplomatically, though he doesn’t believe it for a second. “But the reality is we’ve extended all the mercy we can. Nobody was Kissed. The Dementors are no longer in Azkaban. The Post-War Prohibitions cannot be relaxed, or we’ll simply face a third war.”

“They should count themselves lucky,” Percy rushes out in agreement, and there’s something about how quickly he sides with Harry that sends a shiver down his spine. Harry takes another sip of wine and tries to ignore it.

“We’re all very proud of you,” Molly says as she gets up to go to the kitchen, patting him on the shoulder as she passes. “Achieving everything you’ve ever wanted.”

The cold shiver seems to take up residence in Harry’s stomach then. All he’s ever wanted? That doesn’t seem right. Politics is necessary, certainly. Stopping the Death Eaters from ever being in a position of power again is vital. And that’s what really matters. But _all he’s ever wanted_?

He twists his napkin in his lap. His hands feel clammy with sweat.

Harry pushes the feeling of discomfort away. The whole thing is overstated anyway. Those who escaped imprisonment mostly fled the country. They’ve been living the high life, probably, completely unaffected. There’s no reason why they should be allowed to come back now. Kingsley’s had his day, is all. It’s time for someone with a clearer vision of the future to take the lead.

_It’s time to get things back on track_.

~

On Monday, Harry finds his Auror uniform pressed and hanging in his wardrobe but can’t for the life of him find a clean vest. He rummages around in drawers and digs in the back of his cupboards, exasperated and cursing whatever washing spree Kreacher must have been on over the weekend. He grabs at something white thinking he’s finally succeeded but curses when he discovers it’s not a plain shirt at all. Emblazoned across the chest is a logo that reads _Arctic Monkeys_. Harry stares at it in confusion. 

It’s certainly not his. He’s never seen it before, and can’t work out how it came to be in his drawer. He’s not even sure an ‘arctic monkey’ is a real creature and would put it down to being one of Luna’s flights of fancy except it’s clearly not a woman’s top. It doesn’t make any sense, but he’s running late, the shirt is his size and the logo isn’t going to be visible under his uniform so he tugs it over his head and forgets about it.

Harry’s caseload is still heavy, even though he’s pretty sure these will be his last few weeks on the force, and he spends a frustrating morning surrounded by paperwork. Head Auror Dawlish has been amazing at letting him have as much time off as he needs for campaigning, but Harry can’t let this pile up any longer or Ron will just be stuck with it after he’s gone.

It’s almost two in the afternoon before he forces himself to have a lunch break, taking a clutch of campaign memos with him to read as he heads to a little hole-in-the-wall sandwich place he likes that’s a short walk from the Ministry. He nods at the guy in the open kitchen who grins broadly and gives Harry a thumbs up as he starts automatically making his order without even asking. Harry leans against the tiled wall, trying to focus on talking points for a speech he’s supposed to be giving later in the week.

“Here you go, Harry,” the sandwich guy calls, lining up two neatly wrapped sandwiches on the counter. 

Harry frowns. “I wanted a BLT?” He always gets a BLT. And he likes them best from here because the bacon is extra crispy.

Sandwich Guy—maybe his name is Tom? Harry feels like he knows his name but he’s suddenly not sure that it’s Tom—taps the sandwich on the left. “That’s the BLT, the other one’s the egg and cress.”

Harry glances around, feeling like he’s mixed him up with someone else. The little shop is busy, after all. “No, _just_ a BLT.”

It’s maybe-Tom’s turn to look confused. “But you always get both?” And now Harry’s sure he has him mistaken for some other regular, because Harry doesn’t like egg sandwiches and Ron certainly doesn’t and Harry’s never had a regular order for two sandwiches in his life.

“Not me, mate,” he says with a baffled shake of his head and takes the BLT, leaving his Sickles on the counter, and trying to focus on his notes again as he makes his way out of the shop. The thing is, he must have read these talking points before. Parvati’s note at the top says this is the _final_ set of revisions, and she’s his communications director so she would know. But they’re not familiar to him and he’s not sure that they sit quite right. He feels an uncomfortable prickle at the back of his neck.

It’s one thing to take a strong stance on denying any relaxation of the punishments imposed on Death Eaters but this speech is about creature rights, and while it’s true that the likes of Greyback and others got everything they deserved, imposing stricter controls on creatures more generally feels different. Not all creatures are the same.

He must have missed the decisions they made about this as a team. It’s true he’s been working extremely hard, balancing his caseload and his campaigning, and probably Parvati or one of the younger interns has just gotten a little overzealous with the tone.

He’ll come back to it, Harry thinks, tucking the notes inside his jacket and ignoring them for now. He’ll read over it again tomorrow, maybe, when he’s fresh. Get them to soften the language a bit.

It turns out, though, that he doesn’t get the chance. On Tuesday, Harry and Ron manage a major breakthrough in their main case and spend the next few days arresting potions smugglers and overseeing the dismantling of an illegal lab. It results in long hours and little sleep, and Harry finds that the small amount of downtime he has is consumed with demands from Angelina, his campaign manager, for photo ops and interviews. He counts himself lucky he can seemingly do these almost on autopilot. He feels like he used to be reticent about public speaking, but now it’s almost effortless—political rhetoric spilling easily from his mouth.

_It’s time to get things back on track._

“You’re doing great,” Angelina says encouragingly, patting him on the arm and straightening his tie between a round of pictures in front of the newly-dedicated War Memorial. “You’re exactly what we need. Clear direction from the top.” 

Dennis Creevey, who followed in his brother’s footsteps and became a photographer for the _Prophet_ , calls Harry over again.

Campaigning on top of his usual Auror workload leaves him feeling tired and addled. He finds a pair of Muggle trainers under his bed on Wednesday that he doesn’t even remember buying for himself, white with silver swooshes on the side. He stares at them for a long minute, trying to recall what he’d even want running shoes for, but can’t come up with anything and casts them into the back of his wardrobe with a sigh.

On Thursday, a package is delivered to the Ministry’s Muggle entrance, clearly addressed to Harry, containing a pair of extremely expensive leather gloves and no explanation. He uses the Muggle phonebox nearby to call the retailer to ask about the mix-up and how to send them back and gets an extremely snooty response from the owner saying that there are _no returns on bespoke orders_. 

“But I didn’t order these. They don’t even fit me,” Harry sighs after the man has hung up on him. He figures they must be some ostentatious gift from a well-wisher and throws them in a drawer when he gets home. 

He feels stretched thin and like he needs a holiday, so it’s a relief to get to Friday and have Hermione and Ron and the kids over for a barbecue in the garden at Grimmauld Place. It’s a mild English summer evening and the children play late under the trees while the adults enjoy their wine, picking at the remains of dinner and bowls of fresh strawberries for dessert. Eventually Hermione insists it’s well past Hugo’s bedtime, and Ron goes to round up the trail of toys and abandoned socks and shoes strewn through the grass.

Hermione follows Harry into the kitchen, balancing a precarious tower of bowls and plates.

“Shove over, Harry,” she laughs, nudging his hip. “These are heavy.” She pushes his toaster out of the way to make room for her pile. 

Harry picks up the toaster to move it, but gets distracted. Plugged into the charmed socket in the corner of his kitchen worktop is a black plug with a snaking cord that doesn’t connect to anything. Harry stares at it in confusion and then puts the toaster down so he can tug it out of the socket.

It looks a little like a Muggle lamp cable, he supposes, though it’s been a long time since he’s used a Muggle lamp. In fact the only charmed socket he uses in the whole house is for the television, and even then the _Prophet_ swears there will be a fully-magical version of that by next year.

“What are you doing?” she asks.

“Do you know what this is?” He holds the cable up, turning the plug over in his hand. He feels like he _should_ know what it is. A tickle in the back of his mind that’s almost like recognition.

Hermione frowns for a second. “It’s a … charger.”

The word doesn’t sound right. Harry thinks immediately of horses, but he knows that’s not what she means. Even Hermione seems confused, her brow furrowed as if she’s trying very hard to remember something.

“Yes, a charger. For a Muggle electronic device,” she nods finally.

“Like a lamp?”

“No, something you normally use while not plugged in, like a … mobile phone. Merlin I’ve clearly had too much wine. My mind feels positively sluggish.”

Harry’s aware of mobiles from films, but they’ve always seemed a bit inefficient compared to a Patronus.

“Why would it be here?”

“It’s not yours?”

Harry shrugs and shakes his head. “I don’t own a phone. Or anything else Muggle that needs charging.”

Hermione takes it from him, peering at the embossed letters on the plug and tugging a little at the cable. 

“Maybe someone left it here by accident. They might have been charging their phone while they were visiting?”

Harry tries to think who’s been by the house lately but none of the likely culprits use phones.

“Dean, maybe,” Hermione suggests, and that makes a certain kind of sense. Except.

“When did we last see Dean?” Harry asks, trying to recall. He and Seamus came for dinner the week before last maybe, or….They were at Ginny’s last match at….

Hermione’s expression seems far away as well. Maybe they’ve both had too much wine. “Oh you know. It must have been last month some time. I bet it’s his.”

She hands the charger to Harry and turns back to the dishes, casting to set them cleaning in the sink. Harry tugs open a kitchen drawer, already overstuffed with odds and ends, and tucks the plug inside. He’ll owl Dean tomorrow and let him know he left it behind.

“Get Ron to take the kids home to bed. I’ll open another bottle of wine.”

~

Harry hopes that with the illegal potions case wrapped up neatly he’ll be able to concentrate more fully on the final leg of his campaign, but if anything he finds himself more worn-down and confused. He’s sleeping terribly, tossing and turning and waking in the middle of the night abruptly from vivid dreams of places he’s never been: a country estate where he goes for walks on wild moors; a crowded dance party on a beach, pressed up against a faceless man’s broad chest.

He’s disoriented for several minutes after waking when it happens—nothing at all like his normal dreams. It makes Harry uncomfortable because the closest thing he can compare it to is the unending moments he was forced to spend in Voldemort’s head. Not that Voldemort was ever doing anything aspirational like dancing in Ibiza, but still. It’s unsettling.

And it doesn’t help that he keeps having the feeling someone has been in his house.

No one has, of course. He checks the wards carefully and more than once. But he finds things in places he knows he didn’t put them. And he feels confused by blank spaces on the walls or shelves where he thinks things should be. But it’s a vague sensation; not precise. It’s not like he can actually identify anything specific that’s missing. And somehow that’s even worse.

He has a fruitless argument with Kreacher about it, who snaps at him that if he wants things moved around he can hire a house elf to work during the week. “Kreacher is old and enjoying the peace and quiet now you’re on your own,” he says, disappearing back to Hogwarts with a pop. 

Parvati turns up at his house early in the morning, clutching a bag of pastries and an inhumanly large cup of coffee, but even that doesn’t help as he stares at her speech notes for an address he’s meant to be giving, the words swimming a little. 

“Don’t even worry about it,” she soothes. “The words will be up on the Magi-Prompter. All you have to do is read them.”

“I’m not sure they’re quite right, though,” he says, taking another large gulp of coffee and trying to focus. “I think we need to take another pass at the tone.”

She gives him an indulgent smile. “The language is all agreed, Harry. Stop fretting. You’ll be late for work.” He would argue with her, but she’s right. Time keeps running away on him. The sooner the election is over and he can get some rest, the better.

He encounters Dawlish as he steps out of the Floo and feels bad at arriving so late to work, but the Head Auror gives him a wide smile. “Great work on that speech to the cadets last week, very inspiring. I’m sure you’ll have all of their votes.” 

Harry’s so tired he’s not sure he can distinguish that speech from any of the others he’s given but he’s glad it’s having the desired effect. It’s important work that he’s doing and he’s glad the Head Auror can see that.

_It’s time to get things back on track._

Ron glances across at him, half falling asleep on his hand at work that afternoon and says, “Why don’t we bring some dinner over this evening? You look like you could do with a break.” Harry wants to protest that he’s fine, and also that he still needs to read over Parvati’s new talking points and work out how to fit in an extra couple of hours of door-knocking on Saturday and also—

"Seriously, mate. You're dead on your feet."

And so he finds himself nodding, grateful, and it does help, to just kick back on the couch and chat with them both, the kids at Molly’s for the evening. He suggests they watch a film, but Hermione complains that it’s a dull way to spend time together and argues for a wizarding parlour game. Harry’s pretty sure she mostly likes it because she always beats the pants off Ron and Harry.

“Only if you start with a handicap,” Harry insists.

“Do you have anything to write on,” Hermione asks, digging around in her bag for a quill.

“Sure, let me grab a bit of parchment.”

Harry’s hardly been near his desk at home in the last few days, and he frowns at the teetering piles of papers and reports that he clearly needs to organise. Maybe he can convince Parvati to send one of the campaign interns over to do it. If he asks Kreacher to do it he may never see some of these folders again.

He tugs open a drawer looking for blank parchment, and instead finds a folded piece of paper he doesn’t recognise. It’s typewritten; Muggle. Official-looking. Harry scans it quickly, but it’s hard to understand. 

A _penalty notice_ , he reads. It’s a fine, he realises, for a Muggle vehicle. Parked _over double white lines_ , whatever that means. 

“C’mon mate, it’s not that vital,” he hears Ron call from the other room, and wanders back to join them, still studying the foreign bit of paper.

“I found some parchment in my bag, Harry,” Hermione says, waving it at him. 

“What do you reckon this is?” he asks, holding out the letter for her to take. She tilts it slightly toward the fire so the light is better, frowning as she reads the text.

“This is an infringement notice,” she says, though she sounds uncertain, turning it over to look for more information on the back.

Ron lets out a chuckle. “What did you do, mate? Not a good look for someone running for Minister to be getting fined. You’re the law and order candidate!”

“It’s not mine,” Harry rolls his eyes at Ron, looking back at Hermione for some sort of explanation.

“It has your name on it, Harry. But it’s … this is a parking ticket for a car?”

“Exactly. I don’t own a car. I don’t even know how to drive.”

He’d thought about learning, after the War. But then it seemed unnecessary. It wasn’t as if he needed to go anywhere that he couldn’t get to by Apparating or Floo. He didn’t even have Sirius’ old motorcycle anymore, though he couldn’t remember what had happened to it.

Hermione hums, considering the notice again. “I wonder if someone has used your name. Muggles have a concept they call identity theft, where a person pretends to be someone else to defraud them, gets access to their bank accounts and so on.”

Harry thinks about pointing out that wizards had a similar concept until Gringotts installed Polyjuice-detection wards after their visit during the War, but decides against it.

“Be a bit weird, wouldn’t it?” Ron asks, reaching over with the wine bottle and topping up their glasses. “Stealing the name of the most famous wizard in the world?”

“Well, a Muggle wouldn’t know that unless they knew you, Harry. Do you think this is connected to the Dursleys somehow?”

Harry hasn’t thought about his cousin in years. 

“I doubt it,” he shakes his head. “I don’t think they’d want to be associated with me even to rip me off.”

“How do you even have this?” Hermione asks, passing the notice to Ron, who has reached out and waved a hand for it.

“It was in my desk drawer. Do you think someone is pranking me? How would it even have gotten in here.”

He feels uneasy and paranoid. He doesn’t want to tell them both about his fears because they make absolutely no sense. No one has been in his house. He has the specialist Auror ward diagnostics he’s repeatedly cast to prove it.

“It’s a good point,” Ron says. “How do you get Muggle mail at an unplottable house?”

“Is it addressed here?”

“Harry Potter, PO Box 21 389, London N7 8JZ. What does that mean?”

“It’s a postbox,” Hermione explains. “Just like an owlbox. You can pay to have one, rather than having mail sent to your own home.”

“So we can go and find out who’s behind this, then. Whoever used your name must have signed up to get the post sent there. Easiest case I’ll solve, I reckon.” Ron chuckles, wiping at a smear of cheese on his Auror uniform.

Harry nods, taking the notice back. He keeps looking at the plain institutional text. His name, right there in black and white. Something about it makes him deeply uneasy.

~

“Should we open a file?” Harry muses, when Ron suggests they go to the Mailboxes, Etc branch in Islington the following morning.

Ron side-eyes the pile of paperwork on his desk and wrinkles his nose. “Let’s just see what we find first, shall we? Might be nothing. If it’s Seamus pulling some sort of practical joke, then we’d have to sort that all out here as well. None of us needs that headache.”

They transfigure their uniforms and head to the address Harry looks up on a conjured map.

The shop is small, a cramped counter with appliances behind it—a photocopier, Harry thinks. Some other things he doesn’t recognise, but feels like he should. Along one wall tiny metal doors of the postboxes are lined up in rows.

“We’re going to need a key,” Harry mutters under his breath, glancing at the disinterested employee with his feet up behind the desk reading a magazine.

“I won’t tell if you won’t,” Ron grins, touching the correct door with his finger and casting a barely audible wandless Alohomora.

Inside, they find a clutch of envelopes and advertising flyers. Harry takes them out and Ron relocks the door. 

“THANK YOU for your assistance,” he calls a little too enthusiastically to the clerk who gives him a bemused look, and Harry drags him out onto the footpath before he embarrasses them further.

The flyers are of no use—ads for office products and pizza delivery and real estate listings. The first envelope Harry tears open is a reminder notice about the parking ticket.

“Better pay up, mate,” Ron laughs. “They’ll impound your imaginary car.”

Harry elbows him in the ribs as he opens the next envelope. It’s a receipt for a donation to an LGBT charity, with a handwritten note along the bottom “So grateful for your support Harry.”

“Did you give them money?” Ron asks, but Harry’s already shaking his head. He’s never been particularly political about his sexuality, and he’s certainly never given any thought to Muggle charities. 

“Well, at least whoever’s pranking you has a heart, I guess,” Ron says. 

Harry’s reshuffling the pile of post to get to the last one when his blood runs cold. The final envelope isn’t addressed to him at all. It’s addressed to Draco Malfoy.

That’s a name Harry hasn’t seen or heard in a very long time.

Ron lets out a low whistle. “What the fuck.”

Harry tears into the envelope. It might not be addressed to him, but whoever the hell is playing this stupid game can get stuffed if they’re expecting privacy as far as he’s concerned.

It’s a hold notice from the library at the London School of Economics, letting Draco Malfoy - Student ID number 9437894 - know that his copy of _Davis, Lance E. and Robert A. Huttenback. 2007. Mammon and the Pursuit of the Empire - The Political Economy of British Imperialism 1860-1912_ is ready for collection. 

“Some sort of practical joke, mate. Has to be.”

And, of course. It must be. Draco Malfoy fled to Europe with his mother as soon as his father was sentenced to life in prison and hasn’t been seen since. Harry certainly hasn’t given him a moment’s thought, except perhaps in the general sense that life after the War was a lot more pleasant without the poisonous likes of his ilk around every day. And that under no circumstances should they be allowed to return to wizarding life.

_They should count themselves lucky._

But in any event, Draco Malfoy is definitely not attending a Muggle university in London. So whoever has dreamed up this joke has a warped sense of humour.

“Let’s get to the bottom of this,” Ron says, pulling out the fake Muggle police ID that Aurors use when they need to get people to comply with their instructions before the Obliviators turn up.

He goes back into the shop and brandishes it at the employee who gets to his feet, but doesn’t seem particularly intimidated. 

“We need to see all the paperwork around the opening of this _posthole_ ,” Ron announces assertively.

Harry sighs and shows one of the envelopes to the clerk. “This box number here. What records do you maintain about who signed up for it and when?”

The man tugs open a dented filing cabinet and rifles disinterestedly through a bunch of tired-looking hanging files in mismatched colours, eventually plucking out a sheet of paper and staring at it for a long minute.

“Is this a joke?” he asks finally, looking back at Harry and Ron.

“Excuse me?” 

The man waves up at the corners of the shop’s ceiling, looking around as if for ghosts or cobwebs. “Like, am I on telly or summat?”

“Could we see that?” Harry asks, taking the piece of paper from him. It’s an account opening form, completed with Harry’s details, in Harry’s handwriting. And at the bottom is a photocopy of a driving licence with Harry’s face on it.

“Seriously,” Ron whistles beside him. “What the fuck.”

Harry’s chest feels tight, like he can’t get quite enough air in his lungs, staring at this official-looking depiction of himself that he’s never seen before. Harry asks the man for a copy of the piece of paper, which he begrudgingly makes, all the while glancing over their shoulders as if someone is about to burst forth from somewhere and explain what’s going on. Harry wishes someone would, actually, because nothing about this makes much sense. If it’s a joke, it’s not very funny.

They thank the man for his help and head back out to the street. Harry rubs at the back of his neck. There’s a headache building high behind his eyes and staring at this stupid form isn’t helping.

“Let’s get back to the office and make a plan. We can Apparate from around the back of that pub,” Ron says, waiting for a gap in the traffic to duck across the road.

For a split second Harry’s distracted by something and he swivels around to glance along the crowded footpath. He catches a glimpse of bright blond hair that he imagines for a moment might have been Draco Malfoy. Ridiculous, of course. He hasn’t thought about that tosser in a decade, and now someone is deliberately _trying_ to get Harry to think about him again. Merlin only knows why. Harry wonders where Malfoy wound up. Probably swilling expensive wine in some chateau in Burgundy. Definitely not in a crowd of commuters heading into the Highbury & Islington tube station, in any event.

Harry shakes his head to clear it and jogs after Ron.

Back in their cramped little office at the Ministry, the form seems to make even less sense. 

“We’ve got to tell Dawlish, mate,” Ron says with a sigh. “If someone is out there passing themselves off as you; faking your ID? Well, that’s a real problem.”

Harry can’t do anything but agree. He’s stumped about what’s going on, and the idea of someone masquerading as him feels as invasive as the idea that someone might have been in Grimmauld Place.

Harry’s expecting to be told they have to wait a while for an appointment to see the Head Auror, but a memo flaps back into the room within the hour, demanding they both come to his office immediately.

Dawlish is wearing the tight-lipped expression that usually means he’s displeased. Maybe he’s annoyed that Harry and Ron have started half-investigating this unofficially themselves instead of following proper protocol, but Harry decides not to wait to find out and barrels into an explanation.

“You think someone is harassing you?” 

Harry shrugs. “It hasn’t felt malicious, exactly. But I think they’ve been in my house, so there’s a security threat.”

Ron gives him a concerned glance at this revelation, but holds his tongue.

“Start at the beginning,” Dawlish insists. “Leave nothing out.”

Harry tries to be as objective as he can about it, but it’s hard to work out which things to include, and which things might be just… odd coincidences. 

“I’ve found things at home that I don’t recognise. Items of clothing, Muggle things. And then we discovered this letter, which led us to a Muggle postbox service near my house.” 

He shows the post to Dawlish. For one split second, he considers holding back the library notice addressed to Malfoy. He’s not even sure where the instinct comes from, but it feels harder than it should to pass it over for Dawlish to examine.

The Head Auror’s expression gives nothing away. He straightens the post into a pile and tucks it into a folder.

“Yes. Well. We’ll get the wards at your home re-checked and strengthened, obviously.” Dawlish scribbles some notes on a bit of parchment in his tiny, cramped script. Harry can’t make out what they say.

“It’s vitally important that you tell me if anything else _unusual_ happens. And only me.”

“I don’t think it’s that serious,” Harry argues, although he’s not sure he believes that himself. “Seems more like a prank than anything. A little unnerving, maybe. But there hasn’t been anything threatening in it.”

Yet.

“Only me,” Dawlish reiterates, ignoring Harry’s dismissal altogether and folding his note into a crane that quickly swoops away.

It’s only that evening as Harry’s getting undressed that he realises he still has the parking ticket in his jacket pocket. He should have given it to Dawlish with the papers from the postbox, but he’d forgotten. He’ll find out which Auror’s been assigned the case tomorrow and give it directly to them. Harry thinks for a moment about also mentioning Malfoy, but decides against it. It wasn’t _actually_ Malfoy he’d seen in the street, after all. Just the idea of him. The last thing he needs is for Dawlish to start thinking he’s going crazy.

Really, if anyone is starting to question his mental health, it’s Harry himself.

He tells himself it’s just because he’s unsettled by the idea someone might have gotten into Grimmauld Place without him realising. But even after the Auror Ward Specialists have been and reset everything top to bottom, it doesn’t seem to help.

Late at night he gets this feeling. Like there’s someone else in the house _right then_. The first few times it happens he paces from attic to basement, wand out, casting spells to reveal intruders. But he gradually comes to realise it’s not that he’s seen or heard someone. It’s more that he’s just … _expecting_ someone to be there. That when he’s lying on the couch he feels like he could call out to the kitchen and someone would answer. 

And that doesn’t make any sense at all.


	2. Chapter 2

The strange thing about imagining you’ve seen Draco Malfoy on a street corner is that then the evil little ferret takes up residence in your brain. Harry starts to think he sees him everywhere, just out of the corner of his eye. One time, he looks out his window and thinks Malfoy’s in the small park opposite his house but by the time he shoves his shoes on and sprints across the street to look, there’s no one there. Later in the week, Harry’s walking toward the queue at the little coffee cart at the mouth of Knockturn Alley, and he’s sure Malfoy is taking a cup. But Diagon is crowded and Harry has to manoeuvre around several throngs of shoppers and a couple of well-wishers and when he gets to the cart there’s only two old witches in the queue arguing over whether they should be cutting back on their sugar or can treat themselves to a slice of cake. 

It’s ridiculous, really. Malfoy isn’t going to be waiting for a coffee in Diagon Alley. He’d be hounded out by upstanding wizards, and that’s the least he deserves.

_They should count themselves lucky._

Still. It starts to be a recurring theme—these strange glimpses, this sinking sense of familiarity. It sets Harry’s teeth on edge and makes his shoulders feel tense and hunched, as if against an invisible threat.

“Sir, who is investigating my case?” he asks Dawlish, when they cross paths in the lift that afternoon.

“Ah...Chen is. Why, has something happened? I told you to come straight to me with any new information.”

Harry thinks about Malfoy and about telling Dawlish that he keeps seeing him around, but the thing is he’s not _really_ sure he has. He certainly doesn’t have any evidence. And if Malfoy _was_ swanning around wizarding London someone would surely have said something by now. 

“No, I. No, nothing new, sir.” 

“Well, you just focus on the campaign, Harry. We have it all under control here. It’s time to get things back on track.”

Harry nods. His neck feels tight and there’s the beginnings of a headache starting that feels increasingly familiar. He’ll talk to Chen another day.

_~_

Harry takes the afternoon off work to go to St Mungo’s. He wanders from room to room, handing out election flyers, and wishing patients speedy recoveries. Dennis Creevey comes with him, snapping pictures left and right. Officially, he’s on the _Prophet’s_ payroll, but unofficially he’s more than happy to trail Harry’s campaign, always catching him in just the right light. Harry sits with old Mrs Handisides, who is waiting for some Skelegro to take effect after a fall, as Dennis fiddles with the blinds and twitches at the sheets.

“Very surprising to see you suddenly get into the race like this,” she says. Harry figures she must be a little confused from her accident. There’s been nothing sudden about his campaign. “But I’m sure you’ll do a lovely job, dear,” she assures him, patting him on the hand and smiling for Dennis.

“It’s time to get things back on track,” Harry agrees.

“What things?” she asks, and Harry goes to respond but his tongue feels thick and slow in his mouth for a moment and he ends up just shaking his head with a smile. He catches sight of Luna passing in her garishly-coloured healers’ robes and makes his excuses quickly, thanking Dennis for his efforts as he dashes out the door.

Luna is surprised and delighted to see him and readily agrees to popping out for tea and a sandwich. Harry enthuses to her about all the people he’s been chatting to on the wards and how encouraged he is about the election. It’s gratifying to see such widespread support for extending the Post-War Prohibitions and keeping the Death Eaters in their place.

“It just all seems a bit harsh, Harry,” Luna says softly, looking out the cafe window as if she can’t quite bear to make eye contact with him. She toys with one of her earrings, which seems to have a wide flat leaf sealed inside. Typically Luna.

“I don’t think it’s harsh at all,” Harry argues, folding his flyers over tightly and twisting them a little in his hand. He was expecting Luna to be complimentary. Everyone else has been.

“So much time has passed. Don’t you think we should temper punishment with mercy now?”

Harry shrugs it off. “We have been merciful. None of them got the punishments they deserved, really.”

_They should count themselves lucky._

Luna looks back at him then, her face clouded as if she’s not quite sure she recognises him.

“It’s just… I thought you’d think differently. You didn’t used to be interested in any of this stuff.”

Harry bristles a little at the idea that his key campaign platforms are to be characterised as just _stuff_. He opens his mouth to protest that that’s nonsense—that he’s always been a passionate and vigorous defender of…

“Harry?”

Over Luna’s shoulder, disappearing around a corner outside, that irritatingly familiar shock of blond hair.

“Sorry, I keep thinking I’ve seen Draco Malfoy.” He laughs bitterly, angry at himself for constantly getting distracted by something so ridiculous.

Luna swivels in her seat to look behind her.

“I mean, obviously it wasn’t him,” Harry sighs as she turns back. He rubs at his forehead. Gods, he suddenly feels so very tired. The energy he’d had talking to the voters at St Mungo’s has leaked out of him entirely.

“Well, it might have been,” Luna muses, taking a sip of tea. 

Harry snorts, the sound coming out a little colder and more derisive than he intends. 

“He goes to university somewhere near here. I think,” she goes on, ignoring Harry’s flabbergasted reaction. “Or maybe his flat is near here, I forget which.”

“What are you talking about? He went into exile straight after the War.”

Luna hums in agreement. “But he came back. Three years ago? Four? Gosh you think I’d be able to remember this more clearly.”

Harry scowls at her. 

“Oh don’t look like that, Harry. People change, and grow up. None of us are who we were back then.”

Some people change, Harry thinks. But not the sort of people who were happy to follow Voldemort twice. Not people like the Malfoys.

Luna gets a far away look in her eyes, as she often does. “Perhaps you’re right, Harry,” she says after a long moment. Still, she appears unpersuaded and somehow disappointed in him, and it doesn’t help with the way his head is starting to pound, so he murmurs something about needing to get back to the Ministry and they go their separate ways.

When he returns to work, he calls past Catie Chen’s desk. She seems surprised to see him.

“I was just thinking, one person you might want to look into is Draco Malfoy. I’d been under the impression he was out of the country, but apparently he’s living in London after all.”

Chen looks up at Harry with a confused frown. “You want me to look into Malfoy in connection with … the theft of witches’ robes?”

Harry rubs at his temple. “No, I meant in connection with my…” he trails off. Maybe he misheard Dawlish. Or maybe Dawlish got the name of the Auror in Charge wrong. 

“Never mind,” he calls over his shoulder, as he heads for the Floo. The sooner he takes a pain potion and gets some sleep, the better.

~

Of course, now Harry knows Malfoy is actually in London, and not tending grapevines in Tuscany or eating tiny cakes in Paris, he starts to think maybe he hasn’t been imagining seeing him around the place. And if Malfoy is around then—

“I think Malfoy’s behind this.”

Hermione rolls her eyes, which is not quite the reaction he was expecting. They’re enjoying a pub lunch near her chambers. Hermione’s work as a Wizard Advocate—an entirely new position that she very much helped create in the aftermath of the War—keeps her extremely busy. No one is better suited to immersing themselves in arcane arguments over wizarding law, but it means an opportunity to sit and chat over fish and chips and pints is rare.

“What?” he sighs, taking another sip of his lager.

She gives him a wry grin. “You sounded sixteen years old again all of a sudden.”

Harry slaps his glass down a little too vigorously, annoyed that she isn’t taking him seriously. His beer slops over the rim.

“Well, you have to agree it’s suspicious,” he insists, mopping at it with a paper napkin. “Malfoy’s suddenly back and creeping around and at the same time someone is sneaking into my house and…”

“And what?” Hermione prompts after a beat. “We still don’t even know if all these odd things are connected. Besides, if Luna’s right, Malfoy didn’t _suddenly_ return to London, he’s been back for ages.”

“It’s too much of a coincidence,” Harry argues, annoyed at himself for how unconvincing he sounds. Malfoy is involved somehow. He can feel it with a certainty he can’t explain.

“What would be in it for him?” Hermione asks, her tone carefully diplomatic, the way she sounds when she’s asking Rose a question like _and what have you drawn here, is this a flower?_

Harry collapses back in his chair, rubbing the heel of his hand tiredly at his eyes, sticky with lack of sleep.

“I don’t know. Interfering with the campaign, I guess? He makes me think I’m crazy, or he stalks me until I’m afraid for my safety, trying to get me to drop out of the race. Who knows what he’s up to? But Hermione, if he’s been in my house—leaving things, taking things—anything is possible. Is he going to plant something illegal? Try and blackmail me?”

Hermione’s expression becomes more serious. “I’m not saying you shouldn’t investigate a perceived threat, Harry. But it’s a giant leap from ‘some things in my house have moved around’ to ‘Draco Malfoy is trying to scare me into quitting politics’. It could be anything! Merlin, it could be a poltergeist!”

Harry sighs. It’s not that she’s wrong, exactly. It’s just that Harry knows the difference. He knows with a bone-deep conviction that Malfoy is tied up in this somehow. And that he needs to get to the bottom of it.

“Someone is doing this to me, Hermione,” he sighs. “It’s not a fucking poltergeist.”

She gives him a strange look. “Well, whoever is behind it, they’re not going to succeed. You’re going to win the election, extend the Post-War Prohibitions, and if Malfoy is swanning around in breach of them you can throw him in prison with his father. It’s time to get things back on track.”

Harry takes a deep breath, trying to calm his pulse which is now unaccountably racing. He can feel sweat beading on his upper lip and suddenly he needs fresh air. He signals for the bill, waving away Hermione’s suggestion that they split it. As he rummages in his pocket for an extra galleon, his hand closes around a card. He takes it out and examines it in surprise. He doesn’t recognise it, let alone remember putting it in his pocket. On one side it says “Tab #62” and on the other it says “Friendly Society, Wardour Street, Soho.”

It’s definitely his jacket, but he has no idea what the card is or who might have put it there. Hermione looks at him curiously, but there doesn’t seem any point in discussing it with her further. She’s made her views clear. He’ll go to the address himself and see what he can find.

Back at the Ministry, he visits Dawlish’s assistant, an elderly witch who goes by the name Madam Arabon and who moves at the speed of a snail. 

“Could you tell me who the Auror in Charge is on a file he opened a couple of days ago regarding me.”

She reaches for a giant ledger with shaking hands, running one tremulous finger down a long list of names and numbers. “Nothing here, dear. I’ll let you know as soon as it’s back from Records.”

Harry sighs. The least efficient thing about the entire Auror force is the paperwork.

That evening he decides to go to the address on the card. Being in Muggle London makes him feel itchy. Like there’s something he’s forgotten to do, or like he’s late for an appointment. He follows the directions he’d scribbled down hastily after consulting a conjured map of London, trying to work out whether the crowded footpaths feel familiar but it all seems weirdly abstract. He looks at the rainbow flags adorning the windows of a shop and thinks about the last time he went out. The wizarding community is too small to have a wealth of gay bars, so when he feels like a drink or a dance or company, he comes here to Soho. Or he did. Harry shakes his head and stumbles on an uneven curb, looking around again. He’s definitely been out for a drink, been clubbing, recently. He just can’t remember where...or...when.

He’s clearly been working far too hard. Once this election is behind him he’ll need to rediscover a social life, that’s for sure.

_It’s time to get things back on track._

Resolved, he turns into a narrow lane and finds the door to the bar. 

The place is quirky: over-decorated with plastic dolls stuck to the ceiling and doors leading off to other rooms. It’s still early enough in the evening that it’s mostly empty, and so Harry takes a seat at the bar and orders a beer. He hands over the tab card and the woman serving him retrieves a Muggle credit card in Harry’s name. “Here you go!” she says, handing him a receipt. Two scotch and sodas, two vodka tonics. The date on the receipt is over a month ago. Harry, unsure what else to do, pockets the credit card.

He nurses his drink, looking around the room desperate for clues, anything he recognises, but there’s nothing. He’s sure he’d remember coming somewhere this distinctive. When he finds himself studying every blond who enters a little too closely he swivels back to the bar to order something stronger. 

“Harry!” The bartender is not the same one who served him earlier, and he seems delighted to see him here. “It’s been weeks. What have you and that boy of yours been doing?”

Harry looks at him in confusion, feeling suddenly uneasy. “I think you’ve mixed me up with someone else.”

The bartender laughs, placing a scotch and soda on a napkin in front of him without him asking for it.

“Be a bit hard to confuse you with anyone when you’re here every other week with that scathing but very attractive viper you call a boyfriend.”

Harry chokes on his drink.

“That’s not…” he splutters, wiping at his face with the napkin. “I don’t…”

The bartender just rolls his eyes and smirks. “Oh hush, I know you’re keeping it secret at work. But god, we don’t usually pretend in here.” He pats Harry on the hand, and then mimes zipping his lips. “Your secret is safe with me. Your’s and the rest of central London’s.”

He’s fetched a cocktail shaker and headed back down the bar before Harry can even respond.

The scotch now tastes sour on Harry’s tongue and he pushes the glass away, tossing some Muggle cash down and heading outside as fast as he can. He’s starting to feel like whatever elaborate prank is being played on him may actually succeed in making him crazy after all. 

Harry sleeps terribly again that night, and as soon as the sun has risen enough to cast a greyish light on the streets he decides to go for a run to clear his head. He never usually runs for exercise, but somehow he finds himself turning corners and crossing streets until he’s in the wide green expanse of Clissold Park as if he’s done it dozens of times, almost on autopilot. It’s early enough and he’s more or less alone: a couple of Muggles out walking dogs, some other joggers in the distance. And yet despite that he can’t shake the sense that he’s _not_ alone, glancing over his shoulder compulsively each time he rounds a bend. 

He runs until his muscles burn, finally slowing to a walk as he heads for home.

Harry’s just turning off Upper Street when he sees him, stopped in the middle of the footpath, looking up at a sign. Malfoy’s tall: long limbs; blond hair falling in his eyes as he glances back down at a piece of paper clutched in his hand. He takes up space, indifferent to the way the sea of early-morning commuters is having to part around him. Arrogant as always. It flares rage at the edges of Harry’s frayed nerves and all of a sudden he’s pushing past people to get to him, grabbing at Malfoy’s shoulder before he can think about what he’s doing and shoving him up against the brick wall of a fish restaurant. 

Harry’s suddenly acutely aware of just how close they are, heat radiating off his body from his run. The startled expression on Malfoy’s face narrows into suspicion rather than fear or disgust.

“What the fuck are you playing at?” Harry hisses, holding Malfoy in place against the wall with his forearm.

“You’re the one who just threw me into a fucking wall,” Malfoy sneers back. “I think you’re the one who should be offering explanations.”

Harry leans back a little, conscious that he’s causing a bit of a scene. He doesn’t have his fake Muggle ID with him, and the last thing he needs is to be confronted by the authorities over an assault, even if all he wants to do is punch Malfoy in his pale flawless face.

“Why are you doing this?” he demands, letting up the pressure on Malfoy’s chest a little, but reluctant to let him go completely.

“Doing _what_?” Malfoy snaps. “I was minding my own fucking business before you jumped me like a gorilla.”

“What’s in it for you?” Harry seethes, even more incensed now that Malfoy doesn’t seem prepared to admit to anything. “Sneaking around, following me. I see you everywhere. You’re not even supposed to be in London.”

Something flickers across Malfoy’s expression for just a moment, some split-second of recognition or acknowledgement, but then it’s gone, his stare cold again.

Harry rocks back on his heels, dropping his hold on Malfoy. He’ll just arrest him, he thinks. They can sort this out at the Ministry. But as he’s about to reach to where his wand is holstered at his lower back, his eyes cut down Malfoy’s body and he freezes.

Malfoy is wearing a t-shirt with the Arctic Monkeys logo on it. Suddenly Harry’s furious again.

“You’re trying to make me think I’m crazy, is that it? Why were you in my house? Why would you think it would be funny to leave that stupid shirt in my drawer?”

Malfoy glances down at his chest in confusion and then back up at Harry, his eyes flashing. “You know this shirt?” he asks urgently.

Harry groans, exasperated. “Stop messing about, this has gone on long enough.”

“Because I _don’t_ know this shirt,” Malfoy snaps. “I have no idea what an arctic sodding monkey is, and until a couple of weeks ago, I’d have sworn I’d never worn a Muggle _tee_ shirt in my life, but there’s dozens of them in my flat and I don’t understand what’s happening to me and if you do, then you need to explain yourself.”

Harry’s heart sinks. He thinks immediately back to his own confusion about the t-shirt. _What in Godric’s name is going on?_

“So you’re just going to play dumb, is that it? Pretend you haven’t been creeping around and messing with me. This is about the election, isn’t it? You’re opposed to my politics so you thought you’d stalk me and harrass me!”

“Not everything is about you, you self-centred narcissist,” Malfoy growls back. “I don’t give a fuck about your political campaign or the wizarding world’s stupid little elections. Someone has been messing with me. For days now. I’m constantly finding things I don’t recognise in my home. Everytime I turn around it’s like there’s someone just out of sight, out of the corner of my eye. I feel like there’s somewhere I’m supposed to be. Like I’ve forgotten an appointment but _all the damned time_.”

He slumps back against the wall, as if his outburst has sapped his energy, or as if he’s just now realising the pointlessness of shouting at Harry about it. By contrast, Harry’s brain is racing, thinking about how similar the feeling Malfoy’s describing is to the way he’s been experiencing the world over the last few weeks. That same nagging sense that he’s _missing_ something.

He studies Malfoy more closely: the defeated posture, the tired shadows under his eyes that Harry knows mirror his own. 

“What were you doing, just now?” Harry asks, lowering his voice. If Malfoy is surprised by his abrupt change in demeanor, he doesn’t let on. He produces a green and yellow slip of paper that he has had clutched in his hand. 

“I found this at home. I don’t even know what a _Snappy Snaps_ is, but it had an address on it so.” Malfoy gives a sigh and shrugs. “Nothing else has helped. I thought I’d try here.”

Harry takes the slip of paper and stares at it. He experiences the same discordant feeling he’s had all week. A sort of jangling in his nerves that he can’t understand and can’t get to settle down. 

“I’ll come with you,” Harry says, handing the slip back. 

“Look,” Malfoy groans, “if you’re going to arrest me, let’s just get on with it. It will take me a couple of days to get an Advocate on the continent prepared to represent me in whatever trumped-up breach of the Post-War Prohibitions you intend to charge me with.” Malfoy seems defeated now, the fight completely drained out of him. The way he says it makes Harry feel uncomfortable, as if it’s a foregone conclusion he won’t be treated fairly. Harry feels like he should be affronted by that, and a few minutes ago he probably would have been, but now he keeps looking at the slip of paper in Malfoy’s hand.

“I’m not going to arrest you,” he finds himself saying, before he can think better of it. “I’ll come with you, to this address.”

Malfoy opens his mouth as if he’s about to protest and then thinks better of it, huffing as he pushes off the wall and past Harry, not waiting to see if he’ll follow.

The shopfront is a few doors down, and both Malfoy and Harry stand on the footpath looking at it, puzzled.

“Muggle photography?” Harry asks.

“Seems like. You’d know more than I would.”

Harry frowns at him. “You’re the one who’s been living as a Muggle.”

“Apparently,” Malfoy mutters under his breath, and then strides forward, pushing open the door to the shop.

Harry crosses the threshold in time to see Malfoy give the paper to a young woman, who glances at it briefly and then turns to the shelf behind her where thick shiny green envelopes are stacked, presumably full of photographs.

Harry’s still trying to work out how any of this makes sense. If Luna’s right, and Malfoy’s been lurking around in Muggle London for the last few years, none of this would be confusing to him. But at the same time, it’s extremely confusing for Harry, who feels like all of these things—the bar last night and the mailboxes before it—should be a lot less familiar to him than they seem to be.

The woman hands Malfoy one of the envelopes and he pays her with Muggle money. He turns back to Harry as he opens it, drawing out the stack of pictures, starting to leaf through them quickly. His expression collapses.

“Well, this certainly isn’t going to help matters.” He lets out a humourless laugh.

“What?”

Malfoy thrusts the whole packet at Harry pushing past him out onto the street as if he needs fresh air. When Harry glances down, he can see why. The photos are all of Harry and Malfoy. Together. On holiday, by the looks. Arms slung around one another in front of old stone buildings and pressed together in tiny restaurants with checkered tablecloths.

It sends an ice-cold shudder down Harry’s spine. Whatever spell wrought this is clever and insidious magic. The pictures look real enough, even if they seem oddly frozen compared to the wizarding photographs he’s used to. He’ll need to get experts to analyse them to work out how they’ve been made.

He trails Malfoy outside, still flicking through the pile of pictures. Whoever is behind this certainly has a perverse sense of humour. They’ve made him and Malfoy look genuinely happy in each other’s company. Harry’s brain races as he tries to work out what to do next. What he should do is take Malfoy straight to Dawlish. Malfoy will be put in a cell and they can get the Unspeakables to trace the magic in these photos.

That’s what he _should_ do.

Malfoy sits on a bench opposite the shop. Harry watches the way his knee bounces with pent-up frustration, his hands twisting in his lap. He looks up at Harry and reaches out for the pile of photos again. Harry gives them to him and Malfoy begins to look closely at each one, studying them in turn.

“I feel like I’m losing my mind,” Malfoy says quietly, as he looks at the unmoving photo version of himself laughing uproariously at something this other version of Harry must have said.

Harry flexes his fingers into a fist and relaxes them. His nerves feel pulled taut. 

“I need to show these to the Aurors. Find out what magic was used to make them.” 

Malfoy looks cautious as he hands the packet over. Harry should take him in. So what if Malfoy is right and the Aurors then find a few other Post-War Prohibitions he’s probably breached. The law is the law.

_They should count themselves lucky._

But then he looks at the Arctic Monkeys t-shirt again, fitting perfectly across Malfoy’s broad chest. His morose expression. There’s nothing about him that seems pleased to have unsettled Harry or glad that his scheme is succeeding.

“You didn’t do this, did you,” Harry concedes as he sits down on the bench beside Malfoy. He’s not sure he’d have believed it if he hadn’t been here and seen his reaction in real time. But Malfoy’s never been much of an actor. His emotions have always been writ large across his pointy face. And somehow Harry just knows he’s not the one who’s doing this.

“Let’s compare notes at least,” Harry finds himself saying. “Before I … before we decide what to do next.”

The look Malfoy gives him is extremely skeptical, but he says nothing.

“I need to change my clothes and owl Ron to say that I’m going to be late to work. Why don’t you …” he looks past Malfoy’s shoulder at the street corner that leads through to Grimmauld Place. He should just tell Malfoy to meet him later, but he feels like if he lets him out of his sight some key piece of the puzzle will slip through his fingers. “Come back to mine. I’ll show you what I have, and you can tell me what’s been happening to you.”

Indecision wars across Malfoy’s face. Harry can tell he’s torn between desperately wanting to get away from the risk of arrest, and a deep-seated frustration with not understanding what’s been going on.

Harry holds out his hands in a placating gesture. “We just share what we know. That’s it. I won’t …”

Won’t _what_ , Harry thinks, annoyed with himself. Only moments ago he’d have been delighted to have seen Malfoy bang to rights in a Ministry cell. But now he can’t think of anything more important than getting answers. Punishing Malfoy for all the litany of laws he must have broken can wait.

Malfoy seems not to need the end of the sentence. Or maybe he doesn’t believe Harry in any event. But he gives a cautious nod, and gets to his feet, swiping at imagined dust on his expensive-looking jeans. 

“Lead the way.”


	3. Chapter 3

Harry takes the steps up to his front door two at a time, suddenly self-conscious about having Malfoy inside his home, which is ridiculous really. It’s not as if it matters what an exiled war criminal thinks about how Harry lives. But he finds himself nudging his boots into line in the entry hall and leading Malfoy into the front sitting room he hardly ever uses, rather than the kitchen, where he knows for sure that morning’s breakfast dishes and last night’s takeout containers are still spread out all over the counter. While Kreacher is at Hogwarts during the week, Harry tends to let things slide.

“Do you want tea or something?”

Malfoy stands awkwardly in front of the fireplace, his eyes darting around as if he’s trying to take in details without being caught staring. 

“No. Thank you.”

“I’ll just...let me just rinse off quickly and change. I’ll be back in a tick.”

Harry feels his face heat for no plausible reason and backs quickly out of the room, dashing up the stairs to his bathroom and stripping out of his damp exercise clothes. Under the water, he tips his face back and tries to calm his thoughts. His brain seems to be stuck in an endless loop of incredulity.

_What are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing?_

What he’s doing is standing naked and unarmed while a fucking Death Eater is in his sitting room. Or actually, at this point, anywhere in his damned house.

Harry tries a few calming breaths to get his thoughts in order. The reality is, Malfoy is somehow involved in all of this. His name was on the library notice in the mailbox. He has the same t-shirt that, apparently, neither of them recognise. And now the photos. So, either he’s lying through his teeth and he _is_ behind it all, or they’re both at the centre of it somehow. Harry just needs to discover how.

He dresses quickly and sends a Patronus to Ron telling him he’s going to be a little late and not to worry. If he tells Ron that Malfoy’s here he’ll be over in a heartbeat with Dawlish and Merlin-knows-who-else hot on his heels. And Harry just needs a little time before that happens. Time to work out what’s going on.

He finds Malfoy where he left him, perched on the sofa with one long leg crossed over the other. It’s so jarring, to have an adult version of his childhood rival sitting here in front of him. Malfoy grew up to be attractive, in spite of everything. All sharp cheekbones and jaw, and those pale grey eyes.

“Start at the beginning,” Harry says, sinking into a leather armchair opposite and trying to focus his thoughts. 

Malfoy’s gaze narrows. “The day of the Battle? Or before that?” His tone is arch, as if he’s spoiling for a fight.

That certainly helps Harry concentrate. Now there’s a sour taste in his mouth and he very much wants to punch Malfoy’s sneering face, but he waits him out. Eventually Malfoy’s shoulders drop and he just looks fatigued again.

“Some of it is straightforward. Things I find in my flat that I don’t recognise and don’t have an explanation for. The photo slip. This.” He plucks at the t-shirt he’s wearing. Malfoy leans forward and rests his elbows on his knees, head dropping and his hair falling forward like a curtain. It suits him, soft and without all the potions he used to smear in it as a child. Harry finds himself fighting an irrational urge to reach out and tuck it behind his ear.

“Then there’s the things that are far less clear. Vivid dreams that seem like memories that aren’t. I’m exhausted all the time, as if I’ve been solving advanced arithmancy in my sleep.” 

Harry bites his lip hard enough that it hurts. It sounds so familiar.

“And I find myself saying things that I don’t actually believe. I keep telling people that I think it’s best I move back to Europe. I’m half-way through a sodding university degree, for Salazar’s sake! Why would I want to go back to France?”

_They should count themselves lucky._

Malfoy collapses back on the sofa, eyeing Harry carefully for a moment, as if trying to determine how much more he should say.

“Anyway. There’s a calendar in my flat. And whoever’s doing all of this thought it would be dreadfully amusing to write _your_ birthday party on it for a month ago. In a frighteningly good approximation of my handwriting.”

Harry freezes, glancing at the copy of today’s _Prophet_ on the coffee table. August 28th. He tries to think back a month and it’s like trying to fight through a fog.

“My…” His brain races. He didn’t _have_ a birthday party. He’s never made much of a fuss around his birthday, and this year he just...well, he...he’s pretty sure it was just another day. “I didn’t—”

“I don’t care how you and your little friends celebrated,” Malfoy cuts him off with a dismissive wave. “I just don’t understand why someone would think it amusing or intimidating to do that. Someone wants our paths to cross. And I don’t understand why.”

Neither does Harry. He finds himself staring at the black leather of Malfoy’s watch strap. His pale forearm is resting on his thigh so that Harry can’t see his Mark. Harry wants to take his wrist and gently turn it over. He wants to hold his hand.

“Well?” Malfoy asks, and Harry’s eyes snap up to his. He’s going crazy. That’s the only actual explanation. Whether it’s the lack of sleep or the paranoia or a magical cause. That’s the only way to account for him sitting in his front room wanting to touch Draco Malfoy.

“Quid pro quo,” Malfoy says, gesturing at Harry.

Right. They’re supposed to be sharing information.

“Um, the same I guess,” Harry says, and gets an eyeroll in return. Harry sits up a little straighter, trying to feel more like an Auror and less like his sixteen-year-old self with a crush.

“It started about three weeks ago. I’ve found a t-shirt, shoes. Packages have been delivered that I didn’t order of things I don’t want. There was a letter, here in my office at home but addressed to a commercial mailbox service. Someone pretending to be me had apparently signed up for it.” Harry pauses, unsure about admitting to the next bit. “There was also a letter in the mailbox addressed to you.”

“What?!”

“It was nothing,” Harry insists. “A library notice.”

“You _opened_ my post?” Malfoy is incredulous.

“Well it’s not actually your mail, is it? It’s all part of this sodding scheme. Unless you’re the one who faked being me to open a postbox in the first place.”

“Of course I didn’t,” Malfoy scoffs, still looking irate. “Show me this notice.”

“The Aurors have it,” Harry sighs. 

“Well, you’re a bloody Auror, go and get it back!”

Harry thinks about it but he can’t shake the sense that as soon as he talks to Dawlish about this it’s all going to accelerate away from him.

He gets up and heads to the kitchen to use the Floo, leaving Malfoy where he is, but instead of stepping through he kneels down and calls Ron.

“What are you doing? I know Dawlish gives you a free reign for campaigning but you’ve left me with a tonne of paperwork.” Ron doesn’t seem that put out, just curious.

“Can you do me a favour? Can you find out who’s investigating my case, but don’t ask Dawlish?”

Ron’s face in the fire takes on a frown. “What?”

“Just go through one of the file admin clerks. I just need to know who the Auror in Charge is. Floo me back, I’m at home.” 

Ron shrugs and agrees, disappearing out of the flames. Harry sets the kettle to boiling while he waits, tapping his hand against the worktop. It doesn’t take long before there’s a woosh behind him.

“There’s been some sort of cock-up,” Ron says, and Harry’s heart sinks. It’s about what he was expecting.

“There is no file open, or not that they can find. Do you think Dawlish is looking after it himself off the books for some reason?”

Harry genuinely has no idea, but he has an incredibly bad feeling about it.

“Can you come round do you think? Maybe bring Hermione? I know she’s flat out but I’d really appreciate her take on this.”

Ron agrees. “I’ll get her and bring some sandwiches for lunch. I need a break from all this before my hand turns into a quill anyway. BLT for you?”

Harry nods, and remembers Malfoy sitting upstairs. He says it without thinking, “And an egg and cress.”

“You what? You hate egg.”

Harry’s chest feels tight. He doesn’t even know where the words came from and now all he can think about is the busy little sandwich shop packed with the lunchtime rush and maybe-Tom looking at him like Harry was the one pulling the prank.

“I…” 

He could go upstairs and ask Malfoy what kind of sandwich he actually wants. He could tell Ron that Malfoy is even here for starters. 

“Just bring both, please. I’ll explain when you get here.” 

He waves his wand and disconnects the call.

When he returns to the sitting room he’s trying to work out how to explain Ron and Hermione’s imminent arrival, but he finds Malfoy pacing back and forth in front of the windows.

“When did you decide to run for office?” he asks as soon as Harry enters the room.

Harry’s startled by the change of subject, but he supposes it makes sense if whoever is behind this is trying to get him to drop out.

“Um…” He casts his mind back, to the time before his life was a seemingly never-ending diet of shaking hands and giving speeches.

_It’s time to get things back on track._

“It just seems like a strange thing for you to do. So long after the War. You never seemed like you’d be a political animal when we were young.”

The answer is right on the tip of Harry’s tongue. He’s given it often enough. A humble and self-effacing little tale about how Kingsley relaxing the Post-War Prohibitions was such a _dangerous_ proposition that it forced Harry, unaccustomed to political life, to rise to the challenge.

Except. 

Confronted with the tall, blond reality of a not-remotely-threatening Draco Malfoy in his sitting room, Harry finds the words caught in his mouth. He feels stretched taut between the rage, suspicion and distrust he _should_ be feeling faced with a former Death Eater, and the much more confusing sense of curiosity that seems to be winning out. Some part of him ought to be furious that Malfoy is just _here_ in wizarding London in flagrant breach of the rules, putting everyone at risk. And instead it’s like the voice in his head that is trying to tell him that is, for the first time in a long time, tiny and thready and easily ignored.

“It’s a simple enough question,” Malfoy goads, and there’s something of his sneering teenage self about it. Enough to break Harry out of his odd reverie.

“Months ago,” he answers, trying to pinpoint in his own mind when, but all he’s got is a succession of endless meetings with Angelina and Parvati. How much Angelina still mourns Fred, even after all this time. How Parvati is so determined that their Wartime sacrifices will not be forgotten. How pleased they were that he was taking up the cause. He tries to think about the first meeting. About even hiring them to run the campaign, for that matter. But it’s so fuzzy. Dennis behind the camera, looking so much like his brother: _Just one more picture, Harry_.

“Because the thing is, I don’t think I particularly care about wizarding politics one way or the other,” Malfoy goes on. “Certainly not enough to pay any attention to the fact that you were running for office. And yet when I try and think about it now, about the Post-War Prohibitions and so on, my brain just keeps looping on the idea that I should go back to France as soon as possible.”

_They should count themselves lucky._

It’s a horrible sensation, the way those words keep leaping unbidden into his mind. He’s only just noticing how foreign they feel.

“What’s happened to us?” Harry finds himself asking, his voice scratchy, as if it’s hard to speak.

Malfoy looks stricken. “And why _us_?” he asks. “If a former Death Eater doesn’t want you to be Minister for Magic, why on earth would they involve me?”

By the time Harry hears the Floo roar into life again, he and Malfoy have spread blank parchment all over his coffee table and are trying to make detailed lists of everything out of the ordinary that has happened to them recently. Malfoy startles, looking at Harry with a panicked expression and Harry feels a momentary surge of guilt. “No, it’s okay,” he says, reaching out for Malfoy’s wrist to reassure him but Malfoy snatches it out of his grasp. “It’s just—”

“Mate, what the fuck.” 

Malfoy scrambles to his feet, but doesn’t draw his wand, which is more than Harry can say for Ron who is brandishing his as if he’s just found a troll in Harry’s sitting room. Hermione, carrying bags with their lunch in it, merely looks confused.

“Let me explain,” Harry says, stepping in front of Ron and raising his hands placatingly until Ron lowers his wand, never taking his eyes off Malfoy.

Hermione and Ron both take seats cautiously, but Malfoy paces over to stare out the window, clearly uncomfortable about them being there and furious at Harry for not forewarning him. Harry tries not to think too closely about how he can apparently read Malfoy so easily when this is the first time they’ve spent together since they were children.

Instead, he explains quickly where the two of them have gotten to, showing Hermione the timeline they’ve worked on and handing the packet of photos to Ron. Ron lets out a startled laugh as he looks at them.

“This is Polyjuice?” he asks.

“Possibly,” Malfoy answers, without turning around from the window, his arms wrapped around himself as if he’s cold, though the room is warm enough to be stuffy. “We made a list.”

Harry taps the notes at one end of the coffee table, where he and Malfoy had started speculating about how the photos of the two of them had been created. Polyjuice seemed like the most obvious answer, if the pictures themselves hadn’t been conjured.

“There’s a possibility you’ve overlooked,” Hermione says, her tone cautious. 

Malfoy sighs and turns back to the room, leaning against the sill. He finally lets his arms fall to his sides, and Harry catches sight of the twisted and faded grey lines of his Mark. Harry’s mouth goes dry. 

“I haven’t overlooked it,” Malfoy says. “I just hadn’t gotten around to broaching it with Potter yet.”

Both Harry and Ron glance back and forth between the two of them in confusion, as Malfoy and Hermione seem to have a silent conversation with one another.

“You want to fill us in?” Ron says, after a long minute.

“It’s possible the pictures aren’t faked,” Hermione says thoughtfully, picking up one in which photo-Harry is smacking a kiss to an irritated-looking Malfoy’s cheek. 

Harry finds himself swivelling to look at actual-Malfoy, who now just looks uncomfortable. Malfoy refuses to meet his eye.

“What do you mean?”

“Harry,” Hermione continues gently. “What if this happened, but you’ve forgotten it?”

Ron lets out an outraged laugh that falls flat in the face of silence from everyone else. Harry’s heart is pounding in his chest. 

Ron’s face is red, as if he’s gearing up for a fight. “Come on. Be realistic. I mean, sure, if Harry had somehow found himself in a torrid affair with this pillock I can understand why he’d Obliviate himself but that doesn’t make any sense! We would know! Malfoy would know! I’m his partner for Merlin’s sake. I know he wasn’t on holiday in…” He stabs a finger at the orange date printed in the corner of the photo. “In May!”

Harry’s expecting Malfoy to bristle as well, but instead he just runs a hand through his hair tiredly and finally goes back to perch on the couch. 

“I haven’t been Obliviated,” he says, looking at Hermione and not acknowledging Ron at all. “Or, I mean, not that any standard diagnostic spell reveals.”

“You checked?!” Harry says, startled. Just the idea that Malfoy would entertain the possibility the happy couple in the photos was _actually_ them is incredibly confronting. Harry picks up one of the pictures and studies it, searching himself for any spark of recognition, but there’s nothing. He feels like he would _know_. The awful part is he doesn’t even really recognise such a relaxed and happy version of himself. Lately it’s felt like his life has consisted of nothing but his Auror cases and the campaign. More recently it’s just consisted of feeling exhausted and paranoid all the time. 

Malfoy rubs absently at his eyebrow with his thumb as he gathers his thoughts. “Well, as you know, I’m only allowed to go to St Mungo’s for life-saving emergency treatment, so I haven’t been checked by a Healer.” 

_They should count themselves lucky._

Harry feels like he’s fighting with his own brain. _Did_ he know that? The Post-War Prohibitions cover all kinds of things, but if he’s honest he’s never turned his mind to medical care. It feels wrong. Anyone should be able to go to a hospital, shouldn’t they?

It makes his temples throb.

Ron is still spluttering beside him. “Of _course_ it’s not Obliviation. And you should count yourself lucky you can go to a hospital in this country at all.”

Hermione ignores him. “We should get a Healer to check your work,” she says to Malfoy. “I’m sure you’re right, but it would be best to confirm it. I know how complicated memory charms can be.”

It’s a chilling thought, that what Hermione was able to achieve for her parents—removing their memories of her, implanting false ones—could possibly have happened to him.

Malfoy nods. “If you can find one here who’ll see me.”

“Luna will,” Harry says quickly, thinking about the disappointed tone she had taken with him over tea. Even if it is against the rules, he’s suddenly sure she will help. 

Ron loses his patience. “What are we even talking about here?!” he snaps. “Two days ago you were insisting to Hermione that Malfoy was the one breaking into your house and trying to freak you out. Why are we entertaining the idea that you somehow miraculously became boyfriends without anyone noticing and then decided to forget all about it. What a stupid idea!”

“I don’t believe it’s Obliviation,” Malfoy says, leaning forward to address his answer to Harry. “It would be one thing for me to not notice a gap or changes in my memory. But you’re surrounded by people who would notice.”

Harry tries not to concentrate on the sudden wave of sadness he feels at the idea Malfoy isn’t similarly surrounded.

“I think he’s right,” Hermione says, prompting a slightly strangled noise from Ron. “Even if, somehow, you’d kept this relationship to yourself, and then decided to remove the memories of it…” She pauses for a second, and Harry can see that she’s thinking about her parents. “There’d be no way those of us who see you every day wouldn’t have noticed. There would be missing details, things that didn’t add up. We see you all the time. Lately, while you’ve been campaigning, all of wizarding London does.”

“Why aren’t we arresting him and sorting this all out back at the Ministry?!” Ron sounds exasperated.

“Because I don’t know who I can trust at the Ministry!” Harry fires back, and then there’s nothing but a long silence.

“Well, Dawlish for one,” Ron insists, as if that ought to be obvious. “He’s the Head Auror, Harry. And he’s been your number-one supporter politically. He doesn’t want you to drop out.”

“Then why is there no file?”

“C’mon, mate. You know what the paperwork in the Auror department is like. It’ll be lost or delayed somewhere.”

“Really? Who’s in charge of it then, and why haven’t they been to speak to me? Or you?” He realises as he says it how bizarre it sounds. That Dawlish could have insisted the matter was being properly investigated and yet no one has even taken his statement. How has he not noticed this before now?

“This is really paranoid stuff, Harry. You need to be reasonable. We need to take Malfoy into custody and go by the book. I can’t believe you haven’t already.”

Hermione puts a stilling palm on Ron’s knee. “Why don’t we eat lunch, and talk a little more about what’s been going on first.”

Ron’s jaw is tight with frustration, and he’s still eyeing Malfoy as if he might bite, but eventually he gives a short nod of agreement. Hermione gets out the wrapped sandwiches, clearing a space among the parchment and lining them up. Harry picks up the egg and cress and hands it to Malfoy, who gives him a small pleased smile that Harry swears has probably caused his own face to flush several inexplicable shades. 

“Should have known as soon as Harry asked for that,” Ron scoffs, as if merely liking egg in a sandwich is akin to treason.

“How _did_ you know?” Malfoy asks, folding back the paper fastidiously. Harry can’t stop looking at Malfoy’s hands, but he manages to focus enough to tell them all the story of trying to buy a sandwich for himself and finding that the shopkeeper apparently thought he always bought two.

“I mean, that _could_ be Polyjuice but what would be the point?” Hermione muses, and it’s certainly hard to see why anyone would want to regularly disguise themselves as Harry and Malfoy to buy sandwiches, but the alternative is too jarring to contemplate.

“Harry, why don’t you go and fetch the things that have turned up here. The shoes and so on?”

Harry is grateful for the excuse to get out of the room and away from Malfoy for a second. Sitting so close to him is clouding up his last functioning brain-cells. He goes upstairs and finds the matching t-shirt, the parking ticket, and the leather gloves. He heads back down to the kitchen and retrieves the phone charger, and scoops up the trainers from by the front door. When he gets back to the front room, he finds Ron and Hermione are alone, muttering to each other on the couch. 

“Where is he?”

“Loo,” says Ron with a scowl. “Which he apparently knows how to get to without directions. And which would make sense if he’s been breaking in here and sneaking around.”

“And which would _also_ make sense if he’s been here before and neither he nor Harry remember,” argues Hermione.

Harry feels his neck heat. 

“Or simply because this is his Great Aunt’s house, and he’s probably been here before as a child,” Harry counters, because he much prefers that explanation.

“Possibly, Potter,” Malfoy drawls from behind him, causing Harry to startle and step quickly to one side so that Malfoy’s able to move past him into the room. “But that doesn’t account for the fact that I apparently know you take your tea with milk and two sugars, and shellfish give you hives.” He smells like the lemon soap in Harry’s bathroom, and some other woody scent that shouldn’t be at all familiar but is. Harry holds his breath for a second trying to keep his balance. 

Ron scoffs, oblivious to Harry’s discomfort. “That’s probably been in every _Witch Weekly_ profile written about Harry since the War.

Malfoy arches an eyebrow at him. “My subscription must have gotten lost in the intercontinental mail.”

Ron’s face starts to flush a sort of scarlet that signals an explosion might be on its way, so Harry is quick to lay out the items he’s gathered from around the house to give them all something else to concentrate on. 

Malfoy picks up the gloves and slides his hand into one. “My size,” he notes, flexing his fingers. “Not that that tells us anything. Beautiful quality. Maybe they were a gift?”

Harry had assumed they were a gift for him, but the retailer had been insistent he was the one who’d ordered them. Had he bought them for Malfoy?

“They’re such mundane items,” Hermione sighs, picking up one of the shoes. “Do they even have anything in common?”

“They’re all Muggle items,” Malfoy says, and Hermione frowns at him. 

“If you’re about to start insulting—” Ron huffs.

“It was merely an observation. The unusual things at my house are the same, all Muggle. But that’s less surprising given I’ve been living in Muggle London.”

“We need a plan,” Harry says, running a finger down the closest list on the coffee table, a seemingly disjointed series of unrelated events.

“We need to take him in, Harry. You’re basically harbouring someone who isn’t even allowed to be here.”

He sighs and looks up at Ron, who is still bristling with indignation, seemingly happy to talk about Malfoy as if he isn’t even there. Harry feels an odd sort of panic. He can’t let Malfoy be arrested until he understands what’s going on.

“Tomorrow is Saturday. Let’s get Luna to come here if she can. We’ll get to the bottom of what’s been done to us. And then we will go and see Dawlish first thing on Monday. I promise.”

It’s not much of a plan, Harry concedes to himself, but it buys him a little more time. 

“What if he disappears?” Ron asks, scowling at Malfoy. “You let him go now and he’ll vanish, see if he doesn’t.”

“I’ll stay here,” Malfoy offers with a shrug, and Harry suddenly finds it hard to get a full breath into his chest. 

Ron’s mouth opens and closes like a fish. Harry suspects his own might have just fallen open and stayed that way. It’s an obvious solution, but he can’t believe Malfoy has offered it up so readily and he also can’t work out why he’s having such a physical reaction to the idea. 

“I want to solve this as much as you do. I’m not interested in pissing off to Europe, as much as I might find myself saying it over and over. And I’m not going to get very far working out what’s going on stuck in my Muggle flat without access to any magical resources.”

“It makes sense,” Hermione says, gathering their lunch rubbish and collecting her bag. “We can get Luna to come here in the morning.”

Ron looks like he’s about to object again.

“Harry is a senior Auror, about to be the next Minister for Magic,” she says to him. “I think he can handle one former Death Eater for twenty-four hours, don’t you?”

Harry’s not entirely sure he can, but not for the reasons she thinks so he’s not about to disagree with her, and before he can contribute anything further to the argument, she’s ushered Ron off to the Floo.

“Well,” says Malfoy behind him, as Harry looks helplessly after them at the empty doorway. “Shall we get back to work?”

So Harry sighs, and steels himself for an afternoon of feeling distinctly out of sorts, and returns to the table. They settle back to making lists until they’ve exhausted everything they can think of, and then Malfoy moves them to the library, where he starts pulling old tomes off the shelves that Harry’s never once consulted since inheriting the house.

“It’s more than memory modification,” Malfoy argues, scratching out yet another series of notes on the parchment beside him. “There’s some sort of compulsion involved. This suggestibility we’ve both been suffering from.”

“That’s horrifying, if it’s true,” Harry says, closing another text that has been less than useless. Research has never been his forté. He wishes Hermione had stayed to help.

“And extremely illegal,” Malfoy agrees.

“Listen, I’m knackered,” Harry finally sighs, what seems like hours later. His eyes are swimming and his neck aches, and there’s a weird lump in his throat about the idea of discussing sleeping arrangements. He needs to be somewhere Malfoy is not, so he can stop thinking about how ‘hot scholar’ is definitely a look that suits him. “I’ll leave some pyjamas and a towel in the guest room.” 

Malfoy nods distractedly and doesn’t look up as he leaves.

It takes Harry far too long to fall into an exhausted sleep. He’s spent weeks thinking someone else is in his house and now someone _is_ and it’s even more unsettling knowing exactly who.


	4. Chapter 4

Even though it's Saturday morning, Kreacher is nowhere to be found, so Harry throws some eggs in a pan and hopes for the best. He reckons he could have done without ever knowing what Malfoy looked like, sleep-rumpled and soft, rubbing at his eyes and burying his face in a giant mug of coffee, so he’s extremely glad to hear the Floo roar and have Ron, Hermione and Luna come through.

Luna greets both Harry and Malfoy warmly, something that produces a slightly exasperated noise from Ron. 

“Are you wearing leaves in your ears?” Malfoy says, puzzled.

Luna toys with one of her wide earrings. “Gingko biloba,” she says. “Extremely good for cognitive function.”

Malfoy arches an eyebrow. “Yes, but you’re meant to eat them.”

Harry’s about to interject but then it’s as if Malfoy remembers that Luna is here to help them and he needs to be more polite.

“Thank you for coming,” he says sincerely. “I know this is against the rules.”

Luna gives a delicate shrug. “I don’t agree with the rules,” she says, and takes out her wand.

Luna casts flamboyantly, all of her personality writ large in her wand movements. Nothing at all like the precise, constrained motions of the Healers Harry’s used to seeing. The diagnostic traces spread across Malfoy’s skin and dance back to her wand. She turns and does the same to Harry.

“Neither of you have been Obliviated,” she confirms. “There is a trace of something I’m not familiar with though. She holds out her own hand and casts, murmuring to herself. And then she gestures to Ron and Hermione. “May I?” and repeats her wand movements. 

“What is it?”

“Nothing, as it turns out,” she says, putting her wand away. “There was a tiny copper flourish in the diagnostic trace I didn’t recognise, but it shows up on everybody, so maybe it’s just the nesting slitherwings outside.”

Malfoy and Hermione exchange a skeptical glance.

She gets out a bright pink notebook, covered in fur, and starts making notes of her findings. It reminds Harry of the Monster Book of Monsters, and he leans back a little in case it has teeth. 

“Oh don’t worry, Harry,” Luna giggles. “This diary is Muggle. I just like the colour.”

“Muggles cover diaries in fur?” Ron asks, puzzled.

“You keep your medical notes in a fur-covered diary?” Malfoy asks, more bemused than surprised.

“Oh I keep all sorts of things in here,” Luna says, flicking back through the pages. “Grocery lists. Books I want to read. A reminder about Harry’s birthday party. Why didn’t that happen, Harry? I can’t remember, were you ill?”

Harry’s head snaps up and he finds Malfoy staring at him. 

“Harry didn’t…” Hermione trails off. “Wait, what did you do for your birthday?”

“Nothing,” Harry shrugs. “As far as I know?”

“That’s pretty strange though, isn’t it,” Malfoy points out. “That both Luna and I would have written down that you were having a party.”

Hermione digs around in her bag and pulls out her Reliable Recollector, the magi-calendar Flourish and Botts sells by the dozen. She touches her wand to it so the page for July appears. Nothing on Harry’s birthday at all.

“Ron, check yours?” 

Ron reaches into the inner pocket of his uniform and pulls out his own Reliable Recollecter. Again, nothing.

They look at each other, stumped.

“Was your calendar Muggle?” Hermione asks, and Draco nods. 

“It’s as if it’s vanished from wizarding devices but not Muggle ones. If the party happened, and none of us remember it, then...” She pauses and takes a studying breath. “Whatever happened to Harry and Malfoy may have happened to all of us.”

Harry feels nauseous.

“Let’s say you did have a party,” Ron says, shaking his head and adopting a practical tone. “You’d have invited loads of people. We just need to ask a few more and we’ll get to the bottom of this.” 

It’s a good idea, but they Floo Molly and Arthur, Dean, Seamus, and Ginny and get equally muddled responses from all of them. No one recalls a party, but no one is very sure about it either, and mostly they just want to reassure Harry how excited they are to vote for him in the coming week.

“What about Neville,” Luna suggests. “He just got back from Australia, he might know something?” 

Harry kneels in front of the fire again. 

Neville is delighted to hear from him. “It’s so good to see you,” Harry says, and finds he means it with a sincerity that catches him off guard. These last few weeks have been so unsettling, and the unnerving realisation that his friends and family might be similarly affected has unease sunk deep in his bones. Neville, though—Neville has been in Australia since before all this began. Harry doesn’t have any confusion where Neville is concerned.

“You too!” Neville says. “Feels like I’ve been gone for ages. How is everyone?”

Harry murmurs that they’re all fine, which might be a total lie, as he tries to think how he can direct the conversation to the puzzle they’re trying to solve. 

“And the campaign? I have to say Harry, I was so surprised when you announced. You’ve never seemed like the sort for politics to me.” Neville gives an awkward, apologetic sort of shrug and Harry’s stomach sinks a little. The words are there on the tip of his tongue. _It’s time to get things back on track_. But they’re not _his_ words. He’s increasingly sure of that now. He swallows hard, and tries to get the phrase to go back down.

“A new challenge, I guess,” he mumbles, though it’s harder than it should be, keeping the rhetoric trapped behind his teeth.

Neville takes his empty response at face value. “And the party, how was that?”

Harry’s blood turns to ice. Luna claps, delighted, on the other side of the room.

“Uh, the party...”

Neville frowns and laughs at the same time. “Your birthday party? The one you invited us all to, with actual hand-written invites and all. Very unlike you, really.”

Harry’s brain races to catch up. “But … you weren’t there…”

Neville snorts. “Well, obviously. I was looking at Ghost Gums in Cairns.”

Neville doesn’t seem confused at all. There’s nothing fuzzy about his recollection. 

“You got an invite?” 

A moment of insecurity crosses his face. “I...yes? Did you not mean to send me one?”

That startles a laugh out of Harry. “No, of course, of course. I just. God, Neville this is great news. Are you able to come through for a bit?”

Neville agrees easily and Harry gets up to give him space to step out of the fire, dusting off a little soot.

“Goodness, what’s the occasion?” Neville asks, hugging Hermione and Luna, and clapping Ron on the arm as he snags a piece of cold toast from a plate. “Hello Draco,” he says amiably, and the look of shock on Malfoy’s face is absolutely mirrored on Harry’s own—he can feel it.

“You know me?” Draco says, scrambling to his feet and then standing awkwardly, his long limbs filled with tension, fidgeting as if he doesn’t know what to do with his hands.

Neville looks to Harry and back to Draco again.

“Is this a joke?”

“No, I mean, yes, of course you know who I am,” Draco rushes on, waving as if to dismiss the whole _We went to school together, we have a terrible past_. “But you don’t seem…surprised to see me here?”

“I think you need to give me a bit of background, Harry.” Neville says, sinking into a chair with a sigh. “Why would I be surprised to see you, Draco? You’re usually around—at the pub for lunch on Sundays or having coffee with Harry in that little cafe near work.”

“Salazar…” Draco exhales heavily, staring at Neville in wonder and sitting back down abruptly, a puppet with his strings cut. “You remember.”

Neville is starting to look extremely confused and so Harry starts to pace in front of the fireplace as he thinks of the quickest way to explain. “Something’s happened to our memories, Nev. Or, maybe not our memories, but our minds, certainly.”

“What do you mean?”

“The last six weeks for us—and for Ron and Hermione and others—have been altered in some way. We forgot my birthday party, for example.”

Neville frowns. “Forgot to have it? What sort of memory charm is that?”

“No,” Draco says, “I think Harry had his party. It’s just that no one who was invited can remember going. In fact, they didn’t remember he’d even planned to have one.”

“You were all Obliviated?” Neville sounds justifiably horrified. 

“Not in any way that’s detectable. And it’s more than that. We’ve found ourselves—doing things, saying things that don’t seem quite right.”

“That sounds bloody awful, mate. What do the Aurors say?”

“Exactly my point,” says Ron to the room at large, scowling specifically at Malfoy. “We need to report this.”

“And we will,” Harry insists. “As soon as we’re sure about who we can trust.”

“What are you thinking?” Neville asks, his expression serious. “Something like Swooping Evil? They used that in New York, remember, we read about it in History of Magic. I can’t think of a potion that would create quite the kind of effect you’re describing, though.” 

“Let me show you where we’ve gotten to.”

Draco leads them back to the library, and Harry takes a moment to feel warm and slightly uncomfortable at how at home he seems in Harry’s house. As if it’s an everyday sort of occurrence that they have their friends over for toast and eggs and a spot of light research. He busies himself cleaning up the kitchen, and wonders where the hell Kreacher has gotten to. 

When he rejoins the others in the library, it looks like the books have exploded everywhere. Malfoy seems to have produced a corkboard from somewhere, and it has bits of paper and notes tacked all over it. Luna sits cross-legged in the window seat, books open all around her. And Ron is calling out the names of obscure-sounding plants to Neville who looks them up in a giant tome, shaking his head each time.

An owl arrives, from Angelina, asking if she and Parvati can come over to discuss the final campaign swing. Harry’s stomach sinks. Suddenly the campaign feels like the absolute last thing he wants to think about and he absolutely cannot let them know that he has a former Death Eater in his house. He owls back that he’s suffering from a migraine and it will have to wait, and then he locks the Floo just in case.

Hermione hands him a fourteenth century account to read of a priest who claimed his entire flock had been brainwashed, but the language is archaic and the priest doesn’t come across as that believable. Mostly it’s hard to concentrate when Malfoy is pacing back and forth in a sweater he’s borrowed from Harry with a quill tucked behind one ear, arguing passionately with Hermione as if they do it every weekend. It makes Harry want to sit on his hands so he doesn’t do anything ridiculous with them.

Harry picks up the packet of photos again. The top one is a picture of him and Malfoy, their backs against the stone balustrade of a bridge overlooking a river. They’re smiling at whoever they asked to take the photo, and the wind has whipped Malfoy’s hair to one side. Harry stares at it, wishing it was a wizarding picture and he could see them move. See their smiles. See Malfoy tuck his hair back in frustration. He feels like he’s getting a glimpse into another life, one he’s staggered to find he wants very much. 

“It can’t be,” he hears Hermione saying, and looks up at her horrified tone.

“The description matches,” Malfoy argues, pointing at a page in a book that looks so old it seems at risk of crumbling fully apart. 

“But this has been outlawed since even before the Statute of Secrecy! Look at this—you could use it to make people your puppets and they wouldn’t even be aware of it. It’s like the _worst_ combination of memory modification and hypnosis.”

Malfoy is just nodding.

“To do something like this, to a large number of people, no single witch or wizard could cast this. You’d have to do it in a group.”

Malfoy nods. “See, here. Six casting in parallel. It involves an enormous amount of magical power.”

“Show me?” Luna asks curiously, leaving her sunny spot by the window to read over Hermione’s shoulder. She frowns for a moment, and then turns to Neville. “Could I please cast a medical diagnostic over you?”

He gives a surprised nod, and her wand flourishes, leaving a dancing silver trace in its wake.

“That’s it,” she murmurs.

“What is?” Ron asks.

“I’ve been thinking about that little copper rune that was showing up in our trace diagnostics. At first I just assumed it was something standard that I’d overlooked but I’m very good at diagnostics so that didn’t really make sense.” Luna says this without a hint of bravado. She toys with her earring.

“I’ve been looking up the rune, and it’s this. It’s a trace that shows the person has been subject to this kind of spell.”

“And Neville?” Hermione says, rushing over to the couch as if she can pick up his arm and solve the mystery. 

“Neville shows no trace.”

“So, whenever this happened, it was while Neville was away. Are we thinking it was at the birthday party?” Hermione addresses her question to the group at large.

“But as far as we know, the party never happened,” Ron points out.

“Of course it happened,” an annoyed sounding voice rings out from the hallway. “Kreacher cleaned enough glasses afterwards to know for sure.”

“Kreacher, get in here!” Harry shouts with a gasp. 

The old elf makes absolutely no effort to hurry, trailing into the room dragging a washing basket behind him. He looks extremely irritated to find Harry has guests.

“If Master wanted to entertain, he could have let Kreacher know. When do you think Kreacher will be having time to put all these books away?”

“My birthday party. Can you tell us about it?”

The elf scowls at him.

“Was not that long ago for Master to have forgotten. Kreacher insisted on a _final_ guestlist and then Master has people turn up unannounced. Canapés do not make themselves.” His ugly little chin tilts up defiantly, as if being caught short without enough pigs in blankets is the ultimate insult.

“Who turned up?”

Kreacher gives a disdainful sniff. “Is not Kreacher’s job to take names of party crashers.”

Harry sighs. “What happened. After the party.”

“Your guests left abruptly and before the appointed time. Extremely rude. Particularly this one.” He crooks a finger at Malfoy.

Malfoy shoots forward in his seat, staring at the wizened little elf in earnest. “What do you mean, _particularly me_?”

“Mister Malfoy leaves the party and doesn’t so much as come back to collect your ironing." Kreacher sniffs in the direction of the washing basket, and Harry can only wonder what of Malfoy’s he’s been harbouring all this time.

“His what?” Ron chokes out. 

Harry’s face feels hot. He stares at the little elf as if he barely recognises him. How can Harry have been feeling all of this paranoia and confusion and the answer was right under his feet every weekend, if he’d only thought to ask.

“Ironing,” Kreacher repeats slowly as if Ron is a bit dim. “No manners. Leaves clothes and shoes and books and photographs for Master’s boss to take with him. Disgrace on the house of Black.” 

“Dawlish? Dawlish took Malfoy’s things?” Harry asks.

“Why would Malfoy’s crap be all over the house?” Ron interjects. 

Kreacher glances between them both and at last has the good grace to look a little confused. 

“Mister Malfoy’s things were here because until six weeks ago Mister Malfoy was also always here and then he left and didn’t come back. And Head Auror Dawlish, yes. Kreacher kept out of the way in the kitchen until he was gone.”

“Unbelievable,” whistles Neville, collapsing back on the couch and looking up at the ceiling. “What in Merlin’s name is going on?”

“Will that be all?” Kreacher asks with a scowl.

“Yes, for now, thank you,” Harry gets out, and Kreacher trots away again, muttering under his breath.

“If it _is_ this spell you’ve found,” Neville asks, “how do we break it?”

“That’s part of the problem,” Malfoy says, glancing again at the book. “It takes six witches or wizards to cast this. And the counterspell requires each of their wand signatures. We need to know who those six are.”

“That might work in our favour, actually,” Hermione says thoughtfully, tapping her quill against her chin.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, this magic is prohibited. Highly illegal. For obvious reasons. Mass memory modification is bad enough, but the suggestibility component makes this a capital offence. And it’s very old. I’ve been studying and practicing wizarding law for a decade now. Nothing like this has been attempted in hundreds of years.”

Harry nods. He understands all too well the seriousness of what’s happened here. 

“But how does that—”

“ _Prior Incantato Prohibito_.” Hermione goes on. “A more complex version of the standard spell that reveals prohibited magic. They won’t be able to prevent anyone from finding out that they cast the spell.”

“But we know more than one wizard was behind this. It’s not as if we can just walk around casting at everyone we see in the hopes of stumbling across our villains.”

“No, but we could put everyone back in one place,” Draco says, and everyone turns to look at him. “Let’s throw another party. We’ll say, because you missed your last one and because Neville is now home. And we’ll hint at a “special announcement” so they’ll have to show up for fear that we’ve undone their work. And we’ll send the invitation to everyone who was invited to the last one.”

“And then what?” Harry asks.

“We say that there’s heightened security. Because of the election. And so we have to cast a brief trace on each person that arrives.”

“We’ll give the game away as soon as we reveal the first one, though.”

“That’s just it, we don’t play our hand. Instead of casting _Prior Incantato Prohibito_ , we literally just cast Luna’s diagnostic trace. Every person who fell victim to the last spell will show the copper rune. And every person who doesn’t…”

Ron lets out a low whistle. “That might work.”

Malfoy nods, and points at him. “You’re there with a bunch of Aurors that we’ve already cleared, and you can round up everyone who is responsible at once and then prove they were the ones behind it. We get the wand signatures, and we can reverse the spell.”

Ron gives him a begrudging nod.

They summon an increasingly grumpy Kreacher back and ask for the guestlist for the original party and set about firing off owls. 

Harry looks at the names in turn. All of his close friends and family, exactly who he’d expect, but then he notices something.

“Huh.”

“What is it?” Luna asks.

“There’s no one here on this list from my campaign. I mean I probably wouldn’t have invited all of them, but Angelina at least. Parvati. Probably Dennis, he’d have taken some nice pictures.” 

A sudden, stabbing headache overtakes him as he tries to think about it. He’s supposed to be out convincing voters to support him right now. And the very thing he wants their support for is kicking the man opposite him out of the country and denying him his rights. It’s outrageous. How can he have found himself in this position?

“Luna,” he says, “everyone else here who was affected by the spell was going to vote for me. But when we had tea you didn’t seem like you would be. Why was that?”

“I didn’t agree with you, Harry,” she shrugs.

“What are you thinking Harry?” Hermione asks.

“I’m thinking that _I_ didn’t agree with me,” Harry says, with a pounding sense of certainty.

“You what?” Ron leans forward on his elbows.

“Think about it. I know it’s hard, the spell makes everything so muddy. But can any of you remember when I started campaigning or why?” He looks at each of his friends intently, but they all wear slightly pained expressions, as if they’re battling their own headaches.

“Because....” Hermione eventually speaks, slowly, as if she’s struggling a little. “It’s time to—”

“ _Get things back on track_.” Ron and Harry both finish together with her in unison.

“Exactly!” Harry feels triumphant now, finally able to see light at the end of the tunnel. “What does that mean, and why do we keep saying it? Why would _any_ of us oppose Kingsley politically. We trust him. We agree with him! I don’t want to see Malfoy denied basic human rights!” 

Opposite him, leaning against the desk, Malfoy’s cheeks pink up a little. Harry tries not to get distracted.

Neville shrugs. “It didn’t make any sense to me when I heard you were running. You definitely had no interest in any of that before I left.”

“But if Luna was at the party and had the spell cast on her, why wouldn’t she have also been persuaded and fallen in line?” Malfoy asks.

“Oh I’m not very susceptible to mind control, Draco,” Luna says with a smile. “It’s my earrings.”

He makes a sort of choked off sound of disbelief, but she insists, and Neville—who is of course the expert—confirms that gingko biloba has historically been used for improving memory and so on. “It’s possible,” he mumbles with a slightly embarrassed shrug.

Ron opens his mouth and then closes it again. “You know what?” he says, after a minute. “I don’t trust anything my brain is telling me right now and I hate it. It’s like wearing that sodding locket all over again. Let’s get this wretched spell broken.”

They gather around the book, reading what they can find about the spell, and then concentrate their efforts on planning for the party on Wednesday. 

“I’ll go to see Kingsley on Monday morning,” Ron offers. “He’ll have Aurors he trusts and we can double-check they weren’t involved before lining them up to make the arrests.”

Eventually there’s nothing further to do but wait. The others gather their things and head home through the Floo. Harry thanks Luna profusely for her help. 

“I’m going to get you some gingko too, Harry,” she says. “So this doesn’t happen again.”

Harry shudders, both at the idea she might provide him with earrings she expects him to wear, and at the much more serious realisation that he’s been so horribly vulnerable in this way. He hugs her tightly and waits until she’s through before warding the Floo closed again.

Harry makes dinner while Malfoy continues to read. Kreacher seems to have disappeared off to Merlin-knows-where complaining about having to re-cater a party no one had enjoyed in the first place and has left them to their own devices. Harry puts together a simple pasta dish and feels unaccountably pleased at the way Malfoy makes himself at home, pottering around the pantry to find a bottle of wine and fetching glasses for them both.

“It’s a horrible feeling,” Malfoy says, pushing back his empty plate. “Knowing that we somehow met and got to know each other and…” He trails off, leaving the end of the sentence heavy with suggestion. “And now I have no idea what that was like.”

Harry nods. He doesn’t need the memories restored to know now that it’s true. Seeing Malfoy sitting at his kitchen table, toying with the stem of his wineglass, his face nothing but angles in the soft light. Harry finds himself completely unsurprised to have learned that he was meant to have been here all along.

“Malfoy, I—”

“Draco, I think.” He cuts him off with a small smile. And Harry figures that’s probably right. 

“Draco,” he says with a nod. “I’m going to make sure whoever’s behind this faces justice.”

Draco nods, but it’s with a hint of sadness, as if he doesn’t share Harry’s confidence.

“Thank you for dinner,” he says. “I’m going to take these books up to bed.”

Harry listens to him pottering around upstairs while he tidies the kitchen. It’s the first time he’s felt at peace in weeks.

~

Harry’s startled awake in the morning by Draco calling out for him. He dashes down the stairs two at a time, wand out.

In the library, Draco is staring at the corkboard and doesn’t seem to be in any immediate danger. Harry takes a panting breath and puts his wand down.

“What is it?”

“The car!”

Harry looks at him, waiting for the rest of the sentence, but Malfoy is just looking at him wide-eyed like he’s realised something incredible.

“What do you mean, the car?”

Malfoy stalks over to the corkboard and tugs the parking ticket off, waving it at him. “Let’s say you _did_ have a car, and you did park it irresponsibly, and you did incur a fine.”

Harry frowns at him.

“Where would the car be now? If you owned a car, Potter. Where would you park it?”

“On the street, I guess,” Harry muses. “But—”

“Exactly!” Malfoy crows triumphantly and is heading for the front door before Harry even finishes his thought.

“If I don’t _remember_ owning a car,” Harry tries to reason with him as he trots down the front steps behind him, wishing he’d pulled a dressing gown on over his pyjamas, “How are we going to remember what it looks like?”

“We don’t need to remember,” Malfoy points out, studying the notice again, and then looking up and down the street. “Because the police helpfully recorded all the details here.” He shoves the notice at Harry and takes off down the footpath. Harry stares at the now slightly crumpled piece of paper and realises that Malfoy is right. The details of the infringement specify the vehicle: a white 2006 Renault, and the number plate.

“Here it is!” 

Malfoy is already surreptitiously tapping his wand to the lock as Harry jogs up, opening the door. 

“You can’t break into someone’s car!” Harry hisses.

“I’m not breaking in, it’s your car.” Malfoy says reaching over to flip open the glove compartment. He pulls out the contents and lays the things out on the bonnet for them both to look at.

Harry picks up a slim leather wallet and inside finds the driving licence he’d seen photocopied on the mailbox form, his own face staring up at him. The rest of the items are uninteresting: Muggle bank notes, a receipt from a bookshop.

“Battery’s dead,” Malfoy says, holding up a mobile phone. Shiny, black, unlike anything Harry’s seen before. 

“I think the charger is inside,” he points out.

The last item is a piece of paper with a receipt stapled to it from JMC Classics and Restorations in relation to the restoration of a 1959 Triumph Bonneville motorbike.

“I didn’t keep this,” Harry murmurs, and is aware of Malfoy leaning in to read over his shoulder.

“A motorbike?”

“It was my godfather’s,” Harry says, his temples throbbing in confusion. “But I … didn’t want it. I got rid of it after the War. I …”

“That doesn’t sound like you,” Malfoy counters, and he’s not wrong. It doesn’t sound like something Harry would have done at all. He’s suddenly furious at Dawlish and whoever else is behind this. Who have worked this criminal magic to make him into a person he doesn’t even recognise. Someone who’s been nothing but a puppet for a conservative wizarding cause.

“Come on. Let’s charge the phone.”

Draco makes them both coffee while Harry retrieves the charger and plugs the phone in.

Harry feels a sense of trepidation as he turns the device on, and it’s almost anti-climatic to be faced with rows of little icons he doesn’t recognise. Together, he and Malfoy work through them each in turn, heads bent toward each other over the kitchen table.

In the email folder they find lots of ordinary correspondence pointing to a rich Muggle life Harry is frustrated to no longer remember. Promotions from a gym he apparently belongs to. Newsletters from the Muggle charity he supports. Endless little emails back and forth with Draco’s university email address: making plans for dinners, asking him to pick up shopping, suggesting weekends away.

It’s the photos folder that’s the hardest, though. The pictures in the envelope had felt self-contained: a single vacation that might have been faked. But the pictures on the phone are the full evidence of a relationship well-lived. Perhaps the worst part about it is how many of them ring true for Harry, even if he can’t recall them directly. Dance parties he’s seen in his dreams. The slew of pictures they’d apparently taken of themselves at an Arctic Monkeys gig. 

The most ominous thing they find is an email exchange from the week before Harry’s birthday, in which Harry says he’s going to “talk to Dawlish before they tell everyone” and Draco replies “are you sure?”

“Would you really have done that?” Draco asks, looking at the screen and not at Harry, his cheeks flushed. “Risked everything like that?”

Harry taps back to the photos folder, swiping through smiling, laughing, silly shots. He pauses on one of Draco hiding his face under a pillow, tangled in the sheets of Harry’s bed.

“Yes,” he says simply.

“I should go home,” Draco says quietly, which is not at all the response Harry was hoping for. “I think everyone is convinced now that I’m not going to flee the scene.”

Harry wants to find the words to ask him to stay, but he pauses too long and the Floo roars and then it’s just him, staring at tiny Muggle pictures of a Draco Malfoy he fell in love with and now doesn’t even know.


	5. Chapter 5

Going to work on Monday as if nothing is wrong is one of the harder things Harry has had to do. He’s immediately swamped with calls and Owls from Angelina and Parvarti about campaign activities, but he begs off claiming he’s coming down with something. 

“Just give me until Wednesday,” he pleads and hopes it sounds convincing. “I’ll have shaken this off cold by the party, and then we can concentrate on the final push.”

As if to confirm his worst suspicions, Dawlish more or less immediately calls by their office to check on him.

“Heard you weren’t well, lad,” he says, eyeing Harry carefully. 

“Nothing a day in bed and some Pepper Up won’t fix,” Harry says, blowing his nose noisily and swiping at streaming eyes. 

Dawlish screws up his face and nods, muttering something along the lines of “Get well soon” as he leaves.

“Thank Rose for me,” Harry sighs, tossing the Skiving Snackbox back in Ron’s direction. “She should get useful sweets confiscated more often.”

“You should get out of here,” Ron says, frowning after Dawlish. “Until we know who’s involved in this mess. Merlin knows what they might make you do.”

And Harry’s forced to agree, leaving him at home for two days with Kreacher complaining almost constantly about the plans for the party. It’s a relief to have Kingsley and Ron and a cadre of Aurors he doesn’t know well turn up on Wednesday afternoon.

“I’m very glad you’re here, sir,” he says to Kingsley, even as it makes his temples throb to say it.

“If what Ronald is describing turns out to be true, then we’re facing a crime of unprecedented severity,” the Minister says gravely. “But I for one will be very glad to learn that you haven’t meant the things you’ve been saying lately.”

Harry nods, unable to even be embarrassed, feeling nothing but furious agreement.

Luna arrives, wearing a gorgeous pale green gown and a matching leafy brooch. “Can’t be too careful,” she murmurs, tucking another small handful of leaves into one of Harry’s pockets. Ron stations two Aurors at the Floo to cast the diagnostic traces, and she demonstrates to them exactly what they’re looking for. Harry shows the Minister and the other Aurors to the library to wait, checking that Kreacher is under strict instructions to ensure they’re well-fed.

Harry tugs at his shirt cuffs and tries to tame his hair a little in the mirror. He feels extremely nervous and also a little exhilarated that they might finally be at the end. That his memories will soon be restored and his mind his own again.

As the guests start to arrive he finds himself drifting back and forth between the Floo and the garden, watching as his friends and family arrive. If anyone is puzzled about being scanned by Aurors, they don’t seem to show it. Even Dawlish barely blinks at the standard trace before striding out to the garden. He snatches up a flute of champagne and downs it quickly, but doesn’t otherwise seem particularly on his guard.

Harry glances at Ron, who mouths back, “No rune.” 

Even though he was pretty sure going in, it’s still horrible to have it confirmed in this way.

Almost everyone he’s expecting has arrived when the Floo wooshes to life again and Angelina, Parvati and Dennis step through, with two older wizards Harry doesn’t recognise.

Kreacher takes this moment to wander out of the kitchen with another tray of _vol au vents_ and mutters under his breath. “Exactly like last time. Uninvited. No manners.”

Harry glances at Ron, who is trying to school his face into a neutral expression, and Harry knows for certain without even asking that not one of them is showing a rune. It’s a crushing feeling that leaves him short of breath. To have spent so much time over the last few weeks with these people, day in and day out, thinking he was doing the right thing and have it turn out to have all been manipulated. Nothing but lies.

“Good to see you feeling better, Harry,” Angelina says smoothly, and Harry realises she expects him to be compliant. To not be at all surprised to see her and her co-conspirators in his home. Harry’s head throbs so hard trying to struggle against the disconnect that it’s hard to stay standing. He draws on every ounce of inner strength as he shakes her hand and pastes on a smile. 

“It’s good to get things back on track.”

They all smile broadly as he ushers them out to the garden. “Come on through, I’m about to make a speech. 

Behind him, Ron disappears into the library, and Harry hopes that this will all go as easily as they planned. 

He steps out into the garden and taps a fork against his glass to get everyone’s attention. His headache is splitting, as if the spell can physically detect his attempts to resist it.

“Thank you all for coming,” he says, a gentle Sonorus making sure everyone can hear him. “I’m sorry to make you all attend two birthday parties for me, it is a little greedy.”

The assembled group titter awkwardly, glancing at one another in confusion. Not Dawlish, of course, who is staring at Harry with a piercing expression.

“I wanted one more guest to join us,” he says, looking over his shoulder, as Draco comes out of the house. The guests gasp, and Harry sort of wants to as well, but for a completely different reason. Draco’s midnight blue shirt shows off his pale skin to best advantage, and it’s open at the neck giving Harry too many reasons to concentrate on his collarbones. Draco keeps his eyes on Harry, giving him a small smile of encouragement, and Harry feels steeled by the bravery it's taken for him to step out here in front of a group of people who think they hate him and want him imprisoned, or worse. He turns back to the crowd.

“The truth is, the last time we all gathered here, six interlopers cast a spell on all of us.”

Dawlish is reaching for his wand now and out of the corner of his eye he catches a glimpse of Angelina and Parvati trying to flee, but the Aurors are flooding out of the house casting rapidly and have all of the suspects restrained before they can attempt anything.

“Harry, what is the meaning of this?” cries Molly, echoing the shocked expressions of all of his guests. Fortunately Kingsley takes that moment to step to Harry’s side.

“We won’t keep you here long,” he says. “The Aurors are going to take the wand signatures of these suspects and we’ll shortly cast the countercurse.”

Murmurs of disbelief and indignation spread across the garden, and Harry sinks gratefully to sit on a stone bench and rest. Draco comes to sit beside him, a careful distance between them, but somehow it’s still enormously comforting. 

The Aurors bundle Dawlish and the others inside the house, and a few moments later Ron emerges and passes a piece of parchment to Kingsley. The Minister lifts his wand and with a few careful movements, casts up toward the sky over the centre of the garden. A shower of blue sparks explodes from the tip of his wand, showering down over everyone like rain. Harry feels them, warm and tingling against his skin, and then he blinks slowly, as if waking from an intense dream.

It feels so much lighter, like a dark storm has passed over and left a bright summer afternoon in its wake. All around him, his friends and family are gasping and hugging one another and looking horrified and confused. Harry feels like steel bands have been loosened from around his chest. 

“Kingsley, thank god,” he says. The Minister gives him a careful look. 

“I’m so sorry,” Harry rushes on. “I never wanted to oppose you. Merlin, I can’t think of anything worse than being Minister for Magic.”

This prompts a startled laugh out of Kingsley. “I’m very glad to hear it, Harry.”

“I’ll give a press conference, first thing,” Harry offers quickly. “Withdraw from the race, renounce everything I’ve said. Whatever you need.”

The Minister nods. “I think we’ll need to be announcing a few things in the morning, given it seems the Head Auror is destined for Azkaban. If you’ll excuse me, I need to start getting some answers.”

He leaves with Ron and the Aurors. 

Around them, Harry’s guests are starting to chatter animatedly, piecing together what must have happened. It feels almost like a party again, particularly now that the horrible weight of suggestion has lifted off his shoulders. Harry turns to Draco to say as much and is startled to find him looking bereft, twirling an empty champagne flute in his fingers.

“We did it,” Harry says, leaning a little closer to press his arm against Draco’s, feeling the warmth of him through their shirtsleeves.

“Part of it,” Draco counters, but doesn’t draw his arm away.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Harry, it’s lovely that your nearest and dearest don’t want to throw me in a dungeon any more, but that was only part of the problem, wasn’t it?” He gives a sad little laugh and Harry very much wants to comfort him.

“I don’t understand.”

“I don’t know about you, but I have no more recollection of our weekend in Brighton than I did this morning. Or our plans to remodel your bathroom. Or that hike we went on.”

Harry’s heart sinks. He’d felt so relieved to have the political pressure come off his mind, and so glad to have Draco at his side and no longer under threat, that he hadn’t noticed the memories hadn’t returned as well.

“I have good news and bad news,” Ron says, tugging open the fastenings at the neck of his uniform as he comes up the steps from the house. He looks tired and a little sad.

“The good news is that they’re all singing like canaries. Part of a conservative sect that believe adamantly we’ve gone too far down the path of forgetting the War.” Ron gives a little snort, as if to say _were that even possible_. “Apparently when you told Dawlish you were going to go public with your relationship with Malfoy at your birthday party, they decided to set this whole thing in motion. Two birds with one stone, really. They’d get to stop their war hero’s relationship with someone they revile, and they’d get a political puppet to advance their agenda. Disgusting.”

At least the truth is coming out, Harry thinks. As horrifying as it might be. But his relief is short-lived.

“The bad news is the memory modification is irreversible.”

“What?” 

Draco tenses beside him, and Harry reaches out without looking to take his hand, lacing their fingers together. He waits for some sort of negative reaction from Ron, but Ron glances down and then just rolls his eyes at Harry, before his face settles into a more sympathetic expression.

“I’m really sorry, mate. Obviously we’ll get the Healers and the Unspeakables to look it all over, but these arseholes seem to be being pretty honest about what they did. I don’t think the memories are coming back. They were startled we even worked it out, but it seems like their ancient spellwork just didn't catch Muggle things like a pair of sodding trainers.”

Hermione comes over to join them. She hugs Harry tightly, forcing him to drop Draco’s hand, but then she reaches over and hugs Draco as well, prompting a slightly startled look.

“Thank you,” she says earnestly. “We’d never have solved this without you.”

Draco nods, looking awkward but pleased.

“Do you feel alright now?” Harry asks her.

“I mean, yes, the pressure has lifted. But it feels awful, Harry.” Hermione seems stricken. “I’m going to have to go back over all my legal cases for the last couple of months with a fine-toothed comb. I’m horrified about what I might have done thinking it was in service of this awful cause.”

“You’re not the only one,” sighs Ron.

“Well, at least you won’t be facing that pile of paperwork alone,” Harry says to him with a small smile. It does feel like a relief, to be staying in a role he knows he’s good at, Ron at his side. It’s a small consolation, given all the things he apparently won’t be getting back. 

“I’m going to get a drink,” Draco says, and pats Harry’s knee as he leaves.

“I really am sorry, Harry,” Hermione says. “I’m going to share all my memory charm research with Luna and the team. Maybe there’s a way.”

Maybe, Harry thinks. It makes him heartsore: the tantalising glimpse through the photos and emails of a version of himself that had been so happy. 

“Were you very shocked?” Harry asks, his voice small. He’s not even really sure which of them he’s addressing the question to.

“That you’ve found yourself the least suitable boyfriend in the wizarding world?” Hermione asks with a smile that clearly signals she’s teasing.

“Not really, mate,” Ron says, knocking his fist gently against Harry’s arm. “It was always Malfoy with you, wasn’t it?”

And now that Harry can think clearly again, he reckons that’s about as close to the truth as he’s getting.

~

Harry sees Draco’s bright shock of hair coming up the escalator before he can even pick him out of the crowd. 

“Did it go okay?”

Draco shrugs, his hands shoved deep in his jeans pockets. “I’m going to have a devil of a time catching up before the end of term exams, but the conjured medical records certainly helped. My supervisor is giving me extra tutoring because of my recent _traumatic brain injury_.”

They make their way along the crowded street, Harry tugging Draco close with a hand in the crook of his arm.

“You’ll pass easily,” he assures him.

Draco hums noncommittally in that way Harry’s learning he always does when complimented. For someone so frightfully vain it’s very difficult to get him to accept something nice said to his face.

“Did you see Luna again today?” Draco asks.

“Yeah, no news though. Another battery of tests. One of them made purple smoke come out of my ears. And I recalled a Muggle nursery rhyme I’d forgotten since before school, but nothing more useful than that.”

Draco tugs at his lower lip with his teeth, but says nothing.

“Are you very disappointed that we won’t get the memories back?” Harry asks. He’s willing to let Luna, and the Unspeakables, and Hermione, and anyone else they can think of have a crack at their latest theories on restoring them, but it seems like a fading hope.

“Frustrated, maybe,” Draco replies, and gives him a smug little smile. “I feel like we probably had a pretty good time.”

Harry laughs, and tugs on his arm as they veer into the sidelane and through a door.

“We’ll just have to work extra hard to make new ones then, won’t we?”

The bartender looks up as they come in and gives them a broad grin. “There you two are. You’re too pale to have been sunning yourselves in the Med, what on earth have you been up to?”

Draco smiles in return, leaning in to press a warm kiss to Harry’s jawline, making him blush outrageously as the bartender sets up their drinks. 

“We have absolutely no idea.”

~~~

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Echoes of You - Marianas Trench
> 
> _Adult (and possibly Auror) Harry or Draco has no memory of being partnered with/or in a relationship with the other and is haunted by memories that start to creep in. Maybe NO ONE remembers. Bring on the scary, creepy, haunted moments and the epic fight to find the other at any cost--to prove he was real and what Harry/Draco feels is real._
> 
> * * *
> 
> A tumblr post for sharing is [here](https://harryromper.tumblr.com/post/625969455881666560/fic-claim-haunt-the-corner-of-my-eye-written-as).
> 
> 🎵 This work is part of H/D Wireless, a song inspired, anon, Drarry fest with its home on tumblr! 
> 
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